Oregon Guard soldier shot in Afghanistan recovering

A week after a lone gunman wounded three Oregon Army National Guard members in Kabul, Afghanistan, the most seriously wounded soldier is due to be moved from Germany to Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas in coming days for further medical treatment, a Guard spokesman said Friday.

Soldiers from the 2nd Battalion, 162nd Infantry “were conducting a security patrol when they were engaged by a lone gunman” on Saturday in Kabul, Maj. Stephen Bomar said. “The soldiers subsequently returned fire, killing the gunman.”

One soldier was seriously injured and two sustained non-life-threatening injuries, he said, adding that “It is U.S. military policy not to release the names of the wounded.”

Family members and friends confirmed that Staff Sgt. Steven Tessitore, 37, of Corvallis was the seriously wounded shooting victim, as did Tessitore himself in a public posting to his Facebook page a few days ago, entitled, “Heroes Can Move Faster.”

Tessitore said he was offering cigarettes to local soldiers in the area and talking to shopkeepers when a man approached “wearing a full length scarf over his arms.” Soon, he said, he saw the man was holding a pistol, so he started backing away.

“I hadn’t gotten away from the civilians yet and I’d kept the distance and the pistol roared again and blew fire and death and he mouthed something and I grunted as my body took the round …,” Tessitore said in the post, adding that he soon realized that the round hit him above his armor. He collapsed to the ground. “My world had shrunk to about eight inches of pebbled street,” he wrote.

Tessitore recalled that his fellow soldiers helped get him out of the area. He remembered trying to stay awake long enough for medical help to arrive before he blacked out. He awoke in the hospital in Germany. Tessitore said he is headed home, but he wishes his plane was flying him back to Afghanistan to rejoin his squad.

“I don’t deserve any stories, or accolades,” he wrote. “I was just too slow, and then super lucky. Heroes move faster.”