The Role 3 Multinational Medical Unit at Kandahar Air Field in Afghanistan has been a world-class trauma hospital staffed by medical professionals from the United States and six other countries: Canada, the Netherlands, Denmark, the UK, New Zealand and Australia.
The hospital served more than 15,000 military servicemembers and civilian workers on the Kandahar Air Field in recent years, as well as tens of thousands of additional coalition soldiers stationed throughout Afghanistan. The staff also provided care to Afghans employed in the country’s army and police forces and to Afghan civilians who need medical services to save life, limb, or eyesight.
With the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, the 22nd rotation from Naval Hospital Bremerton, WA, was the last at the Navy’s longest-serving combat casualty hospital.
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- Senior Chief Hospital Corpsman Cameron Wink (left) the last Navy command senior enlisted leader at the NATO Role 3 Multinational Medical Unit (MMU) at Kandahar Air Field, Afghanistan, is joined by Lt. Michelle Taylor, Navy Nurse Corps officer (middle) and Senior Chief Hospital Corpsman Melvin Atangan during physical fitness training to stay fighting fit.
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- The signpost reminded medical personnel that it’s 6,933 miles from Naval Hospital Bremerton (NHB) to the NATO Role 3 Multinational Medical Unit at Kandahar Airfield , Afghanistan, where Navy Medicine personnel deployed serving at what was the Navy’s longest serving combat casualty hospital from 2009 to 2020. In this photo, Hospital Corpsman 1st Class Isaac Kargbo was in his second tour at NHB when he deployed down range from October, 2019 to June, 2020, serving as the leading petty officer for the Radiology Department,
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- Lt. Emmanuel T Dadzie, Medical Service Corps officer, deployed from Naval Hospital Bremerton down range, leads a briefing on patient tracking during a mass casualty exercise to further hone the response capabilities of all hands assigned to the NATO Role 3 Multinational Medical Unit at Kandahar Air Field.
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- Senior Chief Hospital Corpsman Cameron Wink (right) the last Navy command senior enlisted leader at the NATO Role 3 Multinational Medical Unit (MMU) at Kandahar Air Field is joined by Senior Chief Hospital Corpsman Melvin Atangan to display the Navy’s Chief Petty Officer flag in an impromptu photo opportunity in front of Kandahar Airfield, Afghanistan in 2020.
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- A tradition began in 2015, whereby each six-month rotation would paint one of the blast walls outside of the hospital. The blast walls, now referred to as “Legacy Walls,” created a small courtyard outside the Emergency Department, where the 14,000-pound reinforced concrete walls stood sentry as trauma patients arrived to the hospital. On the 12-foot tall walls, each rotation added its unit’s logo and the name of each rotation member. When Navy Medicine turned over the hospital to an Army team in 2020, the walls were whitewashed clean. Photo by LCDR Kate Fitzgerald, USN, Whiskey Rotation PAO, Trauma Nurse.
All photos by Douglas Stutz from the Naval Hospital Bremerton/Navy Medicine Readiness and Training Command.