The 61st Multifunctional Medical Battalion establishes a field hospital within a decommissioned nuclear storage tunnel on March 30, 2026, at West Fort Hood, Texas, as part of a medical training exercise. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)
WEST FORT HOOD, Texas — In a space conceived decades ago to hold nuclear weapons underground, Army medics, nurses and doctors trained to establish a field hospital in the narrow passages where many modern communication tools just don’t work.
The training intends to prepare troops for future wars that could be fought underground as megacities expand across the globe and munitions targeting becomes so specific that the traditional camouflaging of field hospitals stretching across acres of land is too vulnerable, said Col. Brad Franklin, deputy commander of the 1st Medical Brigade at Fort Hood, Texas.
“A lot of that has been reaffirmed by some lessons learned around the world where people have to get underground,” he said Monday as he observed training for the brigade’s 61st Multifunctional Medical Battalion.
The 4-year-old war between Ukraine and Russia has shown how drones and technology have drastically reshaped modern warfare, sending people and troops into subway systems, parking garages and other underground infrastructure for safety and to establish battlefield capabilities free from missile strikes.
To test medical personnel’s ability to work in subterranean conditions, the brigade took advantage of the Cold War-era infrastructure of Fort Hood, Franklin said.
The 61st Multifunctional Medical Battalion establishes a field hospital within a decommissioned nuclear storage tunnel on March 30, 2026, at West Fort Hood, Texas, as part of a medical training exercise. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)
A soldier walks through a decommissioned nuclear storage tunnel March 30, 2026, at West Fort Hood, Texas, as part of a medical training exercise. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)
A surgical team trains within a decommissioned nuclear storage tunnel on March 30, 2026, at West Fort Hood, Texas, as part of a medical training exercise. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)
Sgt. Oluwapelumi Adetunji discusses a patient’s status in a decommissioned nuclear storage tunnel March 30, 2026, at West Fort Hood, Texas, as part of a medical training exercise. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)
Soldiers work in administrative triage station established in a decommissioned nuclear storage tunnel March 30, 2026, at West Fort Hood, Texas, as part of a medical training exercise. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)
Soldiers work in administrative triage station established in a decommissioned nuclear storage tunnel March 30, 2026, at West Fort Hood, Texas, as part of a medical training exercise. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)
“It is about how are they dealing with this with what they have, knowing you don’t have enough people, you don’t have enough surgeons, you don’t have enough nurses,” Franklin said. “It’s forcing them to triage, reverse triage and take care of the casualties.”
First Lt. Zarafina Aninion, battle captain for the exercise, said these shortages forced soldiers to cross-train on jobs outside their normal duties.
“The first 24 hours, there were a lot of learning curves,” she said. “We are utilizing what we had here in the tunnel system. For example, we have bicycles to send runners down the tunnel [with information], and a hardwired phone system.”
The 10-day exercise began last week and has incorporated live role players wearing realistically painted wounds on their bodies. Other challenges involved the length and narrowness of the tunnels, the inability to communicate with cellphones or walkie-talkies, no running water, and the logistics of moving people and supplies through dark hallways.
Because these specific tunnels were built to maintain and store nuclear weapons, large cranes and pulley systems hang from the ceiling and there are established electric and ventilation systems.
The tunnels were decommissioned and cleared beginning in 1969, then reopened about 20 years ago to host training exercises.
Soldiers train on moving patients into a field hospital established within a decommissioned nuclear storage tunnel March 30, 2026, at West Fort Hood, Texas, as part of a medical training exercise. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)
The 61st Multifunctional Medical Battalion trains on collected wounded troops on March 30, 2026, at West Fort Hood, Texas, as part of a medical training exercise. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)
