A Full Meters Under the Earth, a Secret Hospital Treats Ukrainian Soldiers Wounded by Russian Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

Sparse foliage conceal the entrance. A sloping timber tunnel descends to a well-illuminated reception area. There is a surgery unit, outfitted with beds, heart rate sensors and ventilators. And shelves full of medical equipment, drugs and neat piles of spare clothes. Within a staff room with a laundry appliance and hot water heater, physicians monitor a display. The screen reveals the flight patterns of enemy spy drones as they weave in the sky above.

Welcome to the nation's secret below-ground hospital. The facility opened in the eighth month and is the second such installation, located in the eastern part of the country close to the frontline and the city of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region. “Our facility sits 6 metres below the earth. It’s the safest method of providing help to our wounded soldiers. It also ensures medical personnel safe,” said the facility's surgeon, Maj Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

The stabilisation point handles thirty to forty casualties a day. Cases differ widely. Some have devastating limb trauma requiring amputations, or severe stomach wounds. Some patients can walk. The vast majority are the victims of Russian FPV aerial devices, which drop grenades with deadly accuracy. “90% of our patients are from first-person view drones. We see minimal bullet injuries. This is an era of unmanned aircraft and a different kind of war,” the doctor explained.

During one day last week, three soldiers walked with difficulty into the facility. The least severely hurt, 28-year-old one soldier, reported an FPV blast had torn a small hole in his limb. “War is horrific. The guy next to me, Vasyl, was killed,” he said. “He fell down. Subsequently the Russians dropped a another explosive on him.” He continued: “Everything in the village is destroyed. There are UAVs everywhere and casualties. Our side's and the enemy's.”

The soldier said his unit endured 43 days in a forest area near Pokrovsk, which Russia has been attempting to capture for many months. The only way to get to their location was by walking. Necessary provisions arrived by quadcopter: rations and water. A week after he was injured, he traveled five kilometers (about 3 miles), taking several hours, to where an armoured vehicle was able to evacuate him. Upon arrival, a medic assessed his vital signs. Following care, a medical attendant provided him with fresh non-military attire: a T-shirt and a pair of light-colored jeans.

A different casualty, 38-year-old a serviceman, recounted a UAV explosion had left him with a head injury. “I was in a dugout. Suddenly it went dark. I couldn’t feel any feeling or any sound,” he said. “I believe I was fortunate to survive. My cousin has been killed. We face ongoing explosions.” A construction worker working in a neighboring country, Filipchuk said he had come back to Ukraine and volunteered to fight days before the Russian leader's full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Another military member, Taras Mykolaichuk, had been struck in the back. He expressed pain as medical staff laid him on a medical cot, took off a bloody dressing and cleaned his recent shrapnel wound. Wrapped in a foil blanket, he borrowed a mobile phone to ring his family member. “A piece of mortar hit me. The cause was a deflected projectile. I’m OK,” he told her. What were his plans now? “To get better. This may require a few months. Subsequently, to go back to my unit. Our forces has to protect our country,” he affirmed.

Since 2022, enemy forces has repeatedly targeted medical centers, clinics, maternity wards and emergency vehicles. According to international monitors, 261 medical personnel have been killed in nearly two thousand assaults. The underground facility is built from four reinforced shelters, with wooden supports, soil and sand laid on top reaching ground level. It is designed to resist direct hits from large-caliber artillery shells and even three eight-kilogram TNT charges dropped by drone.

A major steel and mining company, which funded the building, intends to build twenty units in total. A senior official of Ukraine’s security agency and ex- military leader, Rustem Umerov, declared they would be “vitally essential for preserving the survival of our military and supporting troops on the battlefront.” The organization described the initiative as the “most ambitious and demanding” it had implemented since Russia’s military offensive.

Holovashchenko, said certain wounded personnel had to wait many hours or even multiple days before they could be evacuated because of the threat of air assaults. “Our facility received two critically ill patients who came at the early hours. I had to perform a double amputation on one of them. His bleeding control device had been applied for such an extended period there was no alternative.” How did he cope with severe surgeries? “I’ve been healthcare for 20 years. You have to concentrate,” he said.

Medical assistants transported Mykolaichuk through the tunnel and into an emergency vehicle. The vehicle was stationed beneath a shrub. He and the other soldiers were taken to the urban center of a major city for further treatment. The underground hospital staff took a break. The facility's orange feline, the mascot, walked up to the doorway to await the next arrivals. “We are open around the clock,” Holovashchenko stated. “It doesn’t stop.”