A team of Army medical personnel based in Mobile is preparing to deploy to Afghanistan, marking the next overseas deployment for the 946th Forward Surgical Team under its newly assigned commander.
Lt. Col. Peter Ray, a plastic surgeon originally from Birmingham, has taken over as commander of the 946th Forward Surgical Team, which is based out of Mobile. Within days, Ray and 14 other members of the unit are scheduled to leave for Afghanistan, where they will spend the coming months providing trauma care close to the front lines.
For Ray, who joined the military in 1995, this will be his third deployment to Afghanistan. He said the mission of a forward surgical team is narrow but critical: stabilizing the most severely wounded troops long enough for them to survive transport to a larger combat support hospital.
“The unit is a Forward Surgical Team, which is a very specific medical configuration,” Ray said. “Our primary mission is to provide life-saving control of bleeding and initial stabilization of casualties until they can be safely moved by helicopter to the next level of care, which would be the organized combat support hospital.”
Ray said the unit’s 15 deploying members have spent nearly a year training for the mission, with the Army building in short breaks so soldiers could spend the holidays with their families before shipping out.
“I think all of our soldiers were able to have Thanksgiving. They had additional training, and they were able to have Christmas and actually New Year’s,” Ray said. “That’s why they’ll be heading down there in the next 24 to 48 hours.”
Ray said this deployment will keep him and his fellow soldiers overseas anywhere from six months to a year. His previous deployment placed him near Afghanistan’s eastern border with Pakistan; this time, his unit will be stationed farther west in the country.
He acknowledged that assignments and timelines can shift once boots are on the ground, but said he is focused on the mission directly in front of him rather than trying to predict how much longer American forces will be engaged in the region.
“I think as long as we’re fighting, surgeons will have to help patch people up,” Ray said.
Before the unit departs, the community will get a chance to send them off. A deployment ceremony for the 946th Forward Surgical Team is set for Tuesday at 10 a.m. at Fort Whiting in Mobile, sponsored by VFW Post 49. Family members, fellow veterans and residents are expected to attend to honor Ray and the other soldiers as they prepare to leave home for the war zone.
Forward surgical teams like the 946th are among the smallest and most mobile medical units the Army fields, typically made up of surgeons, nurses, medics and support staff who can set up and break down a working operating room in a matter of hours. Their proximity to combat operations has been credited with saving the lives of wounded service members who might not otherwise survive the trip to a full-scale military hospital.
For Mobile, the deployment is a reminder of the sacrifices made by local citizen-soldiers who balance careers in medicine with military service. Ray’s unit is expected to remain in Afghanistan through the bulk of the coming year before returning home to Mobile.