A Full Meters Below the Earth, a Secret Medical Facility Cares for Ukrainian Troops Injured by Enemy Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

Scrubby trees hide the entrance. One sloping wooden passageway leads down to a well-illuminated reception area. There is a surgery unit, outfitted with beds, heart rate sensors and ventilators. And shelves full of healthcare supplies, medications and organized stacks of spare clothes. In a staff room with a washing machine and kettle, doctors monitor a screen. It shows the movements of enemy surveillance UAVs as they zigzag in the sky above.

This is the nation's covert underground hospital. The facility began operations in August and is the second such installation, situated in eastern Ukraine not far from the combat zone and the city of a key location in Donetsk oblast. “Our facility sits six meters below the ground. It’s the safest method of delivering care to our injured soldiers. It also ensures healthcare workers safe,” said the clinic’s surgeon, Maj the chief surgeon.

This medical station handles thirty to forty patients a each day. Cases differ widely. Certain individuals suffer from catastrophic limb trauma necessitating surgical removal, or serious stomach wounds. Some patients can walk. The vast majority are the casualties of enemy first-person view (FPV) drones, which release explosives with lethal accuracy. “Ninety per cent of our patients are from FPVs. We encounter few gunshot wounds. It’s an era of drones and a different kind of conflict,” the doctor explained.

On one afternoon recently, a group of three military members walked with difficulty into the hospital. The least severely hurt, 28-year-old one soldier, said an first-person view drone blast had ripped a small hole in his leg. “Conflict is horrific. The guy next to me, Vasyl, was fatally wounded,” he said. “He collapsed. Subsequently the enemy forces released a second explosive on him.” He added: “All structures in the village is destroyed. We see UAVs all around and casualties. Our side's and the enemy's.”

Dvorskyi said his unit endured over a month in a wooded zone close to Pokrovsk, which Russia has been attempting to capture for many months. Sole access to get to their location was by walking. Necessary provisions arrived by drone: rations and water. A week following he was hurt, he traveled five kilometers (roughly three miles), requiring several hours, to where an military transport was able to pick him up. Upon arrival, a medic assessed his vital signs. Following care, a nurse gave him new civilian clothes: a shirt and a pair of pale denim trousers.

Another patient, 38-year-old a serviceman, said a UAV explosion had left him with a head injury. “My position was in a dugout. It suddenly became black. I couldn’t feel any feeling or any sound,” he explained. “I believe I was fortunate to remain alive. My cousin has been killed. There are continuous detonations.” A construction worker employed in Lithuania, he noted he had returned to his homeland and volunteered to fight shortly before the Russian leader's full-scale invasion in February 2022.

A third soldier, a serviceman, had been struck in the back. He groaned as medical staff placed him on a medical cot, removed a stained dressing and treated his recent shrapnel wound. Wrapped in a foil blanket, he borrowed a mobile phone to call his family member. “A fragment of artillery struck me. The cause was a deflected projectile. I’m OK,” he informed her. What were his plans now? “To get better. That will take a few months. Subsequently, to go back to my military group. Someone has to protect our country,” he affirmed.

Over the past years, Russia has repeatedly targeted hospitals, clinics, obstetric units and ambulances. According to international monitors, over two hundred medical personnel have been fatally attacked in almost two thousand assaults. The underground facility is constructed from multiple reinforced shelters, with wooden supports, earth and granular material placed above reaching the surface. It can withstand direct hits from large-caliber artillery shells and even multiple 8kg explosive devices released by drone.

A major industrial group, which financed the building, plans to build twenty units in all. The head of Ukraine’s security agency and ex- military leader, Rustem Umerov, declared they would be “critically essential for preserving the lives of our armed forces and assisting defenders on the frontline.” The company described the initiative as the “most ambitious and demanding” it had implemented since Russia’s military offensive.

The surgeon, said some injured soldiers had to wait hours or even days before they could be transported because of the danger of air assaults. “Our facility received two critically ill casualties who came at 3am. It was necessary to perform a double amputation on one of them. The soldier's bleeding control device had been on for such an extended period there was no other option.” What is his method with severe surgeries? “My career in medicine for 20 years. You have to focus,” he said.

Medical assistants transported Mykolaichuk up the tunnel and into an ambulance. The vehicle was parked beneath a bush. He and the two other military members were taken to the city of a major city for additional medical care. The subterranean hospital staff paused for rest. The hospital’s ginger cat, Vasilevs, padded toward the entrance to greet the next arrivals. “We are active around the clock,” Holovashchenko stated. “The work is continuous.”