🔗 Share this article

Sparse trees hide the entryway. A sloping wooden passageway leads down to a brightly lit reception area. Inside lies a operating ward, outfitted with gurneys, cardiac monitors and breathing machines. Plus shelves stocked of medical equipment, drugs and organized stacks of extra garments. In a break area with a washing machine and hot water heater, physicians keep an eye on a display. It shows the flight patterns of Russian spy drones as they weave in the sky above.

Hospital personnel at an subterranean hospital look at a screen displaying enemy kamikaze and surveillance UAVs in the area.

This is Ukraine’s secret underground hospital. The facility began operations in the eighth month and is the second of its kind, located in the eastern part of the country close to the combat zone and the city of Pokrovsk in Donetsk oblast. “We are 6 metres under the ground. It’s the most secure method of delivering care to our wounded military personnel. And it keeps healthcare workers safe,” said the facility's surgeon, Major Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

The stabilisation point treats 30-40 casualties a day. Cases differ widely. Some have catastrophic limb trauma necessitating surgical removal, or severe abdominal injuries. Others can move on their own. The vast majority are the casualties of Russian first-person view (FPV) aerial devices, which drop grenades with deadly accuracy. “Ninety per cent of our cases are from FPVs. We encounter few gunshot wounds. This is an era of unmanned aircraft and a different kind of war,” the surgeon said.

Maj Oleksandr Holovashchenko at the underground installation for caring for wounded troops in the eastern region.

During one day recently, three military members walked with difficulty into the facility. The least severely hurt, twenty-eight-year-old one soldier, said an first-person view drone explosion had ripped a small hole in his limb. “War is terrible. The guy beside me, a fellow soldier, was fatally wounded,” he said. “He collapsed. Subsequently the Russians dropped a second grenade on him.” He added: “All structures in the village is destroyed. There are UAVs everywhere and bodies. Our side's and theirs.”

The soldier explained his squad endured 43 days in a wooded zone near Pokrovsk, which enemy forces has been attempting to capture for many months. The only way to get to their position was on foot. All supplies arrived by drone: rations and water. A week following he was injured, he traveled 5km (about 3 miles), taking three hours, to where an armoured vehicle was able to pick him up. Upon arrival, a medic assessed his vital signs. Following care, a medical attendant gave him new civilian clothes: a T-shirt and a set of light-colored jeans.

Artem Dvorskiy, 28, said a first-person view aerial device caused a minor injury in his lower limb.

A different casualty, 38-year-old Pavlo Filipchuk, said a drone blast had resulted in a head injury. “My position was in a dugout. It suddenly went dark. I couldn’t feel any feeling or any sound,” he said. “I believe I was fortunate to remain alive. A relative has been killed. There are continuous detonations.” A builder employed in Lithuania, he noted he had returned to his homeland and enlisted to serve days before the Russian leader's full-scale invasion in early 2022.

A third soldier, Taras Mykolaichuk, had been hit in the upper body. He groaned as doctors placed him on a medical cot, removed a stained dressing and treated his recent injury from fragments. Wrapped in a thermal sheet, he borrowed a cellphone to call his sister. “A piece of artillery hit me. It was a deflected projectile. I’m OK,” he told her. What comes next for him? “To get better. This may require a few months. Subsequently, to go back to my unit. Someone must protect our country,” he said.

Medical staff care for Taras Mykolaichuk, who was injured in the dorsal area by a piece of artillery shell.

Since 2022, Russia has repeatedly attacked medical centers, clinics, maternity wards and ambulances. According to human rights groups, 261 medical personnel have been killed in nearly 2,000 assaults. This subterranean hospital is constructed from four reinforced shelters, with wooden supports, soil and granular material placed above up to ground level. It can withstand direct hits from 152mm projectiles and even three eight-kilogram TNT charges dropped by aerial means.

The Ukrainian industrial group, which funded the construction, intends to erect 20 units in all. The head of the nation's national security council and former defence minister, Rustem Umerov, said they would be “vitally important for saving the survival of our military and assisting troops on the frontline.” The organization referred to the project as the “largest-scale and challenging” it had undertaken after Russia’s invasion.

One of the facility's surgical rooms.

The surgeon, explained some injured personnel had to endure delays hours or even multiple days before they could be transported due to the threat of aerial attacks. “Our facility received two critically ill casualties who came at 3am. It was necessary to carry out a removal of both limbs on one of them. The soldier's bleeding control device had been on for so long there was no other option.” What is his method with severe operations? “My career in medicine for 20 years. You have to focus,” he remarked.

Medical assistants transported Mykolaichuk through the tunnel and into an ambulance. The transport was stationed beneath a shrub. He and the other soldiers were taken to the urban center of Dnipro for further treatment. The underground medical team took a break. The facility's orange feline, Vasilevs, walked up to the entrance to greet the next arrivals. “We are open 24 hours a day,” the surgeon said. “It doesn’t stop.”