Six Metres Below Ground, a Secret Medical Facility Cares for Ukrainian Troops Injured by Russian Drones

Scrubby foliage hide the entrance. A sloping timber passageway descends to a brightly lit reception area. There is a surgery unit, outfitted with beds, cardiac monitors and ventilators. Plus cabinets stocked of medical equipment, medications and organized stacks of extra garments. In a staff room with a washing machine and kettle, physicians monitor a display. It shows the movements of Russian spy drones as they zigzag in the air above.

This is the nation's covert underground hospital. This center opened in August and is the second of its kind, situated in eastern Ukraine close to the frontline and the urban area of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region. “Our facility sits 6 metres below the earth. This is the most secure way of delivering care to our wounded soldiers. It also ensures medical personnel protected,” stated the clinic’s surgeon, Major Oleksandr Holovashchenko.

This medical station treats thirty to forty patients a each day. Cases differ widely. Certain individuals suffer from devastating limb trauma requiring surgical removal, or severe stomach wounds. Others can walk. Almost all are the victims of Russian FPV drones, which release grenades with deadly precision. “Ninety per cent of our patients are from FPVs. We encounter minimal gunshot wounds. This is an era of drones and a different kind of war,” the surgeon said.

During one day last week, three soldiers limped into the hospital. The least severely hurt, twenty-eight-year-old one soldier, said an FPV explosion had torn a small hole in his leg. “War is terrible. The guy beside me, Vasyl, was killed,” he said. “He collapsed. Then the Russians released a second explosive on him.” He continued: “Everything in the settlement is demolished. We see UAVs all around and casualties. Ours and the enemy's.”

The soldier explained his unit spent over a month in a wooded zone near Pokrovsk, which Russia has been attempting to capture since last year. The only way to reach their location was by walking. All supplies came by quadcopter: food and drinking water. Seven days after he was injured, he traveled 5km (about 3 miles), requiring three hours, to where an military transport was able to evacuate him. Upon arrival, a medic assessed his physical condition. Following care, a medical attendant provided him with new civilian clothes: a T-shirt and a set of pale jeans.

Another patient, thirty-eight-year-old a serviceman, said a drone blast had left him with a head injury. “I 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 construction worker working in a neighboring country, he noted he had returned to Ukraine and volunteered to fight days before Vladimir Putin’s large-scale attack in February 2022.

A third soldier, a serviceman, had been hit in the back. He groaned as doctors placed him on a medical cot, took off a bloody bandage and treated his recent injury from fragments. Wrapped in a thermal sheet, he borrowed a cellphone to ring his sister. “A fragment of artillery hit me. It was a ricochet. I’m OK,” he told her. What were his plans now? “To recover. That will take a few months. After that, to return to my unit. Someone has to protect our nation,” he said.

Since 2022, enemy forces has consistently targeted medical centers, clinics, maternity wards and emergency vehicles. Per human rights groups, over two hundred health workers have been fatally attacked in almost two thousand assaults. The underground facility is built from multiple reinforced shelters, with timber beams, soil and sand laid on top up to the surface. It can withstand impacts from 152mm projectiles and even three 8kg explosive devices dropped by drone.

The Ukrainian industrial group, which funded the construction, plans to erect 20 facilities in total. The head of Ukraine’s security agency and former military leader, Rustem Umerov, declared they would be “vitally essential for saving the survival of our military and supporting defenders on the battlefront.” The company referred to the project as the “largest-scale and demanding” it had undertaken after the enemy's military offensive.

The surgeon, explained certain injured soldiers had to wait hours or even multiple days before they could be transported because of the threat of aerial attacks. “Our facility received a pair of severely injured patients who came at the early hours. It was necessary to perform a removal of both limbs on one of them. The soldier's bleeding control device had been applied for such an extended period there was no alternative.” What is his method with severe operations? “I’ve been healthcare for 20 years. One must focus,” he said.

Medical assistants wheeled Mykolaichuk through the tunnel and into an ambulance. The transport was parked under a bush. He and the other soldiers were taken to the city of Dnipro for additional medical care. The underground hospital staff paused for rest. The facility's ginger cat, Vasilevs, padded toward the entrance to greet the incoming patients. “We are open 24 hours a day,” Holovashchenko stated. “It doesn’t stop.”