By Master Sgt. Mark W. Rodgers, USA
Special to American Forces Press Service
Sept. 4, 2007 - Four Afghan National Army cadets have finished a two-week internship program with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers here. The cadets are third-year students at the National Military Academy Afghanistan here. The academy, with more than 700 cadets, is modelled after the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y. The internship, which ended Aug. 30, was the brainchild of Army Maj. Richard Gash, a civil engineering professor at West Point. He worked at the Afghan academy this summer developing future academic courses. U.S. Military Academy cadets participate in a similar internship program with Army Corps of Engineer districts in the United States.
"We have cadets from West Point every summer," said Nova L. Robbins, program manager with the Afghan National Army. "We are going to turn it over to (the Afghan cadets) someday; why not mentor them?"
Afghan cadets are required to select from one military and one civilian discipline to study. "We had four choices: civil engineering, computer science, English and law," said Cadet Shafiq Mohammad. "We need many engineers, and this (to me) is the top class at the academy; this is why I chose engineering."
During their two-week internship, the cadets worked and interacted with numerous units. Cadets who participated in this inaugural internship program spent half of their annual month-long school break with the Corps of Engineers Afghan Engineer District. They were selected from 18 of their Afghan peers to learn about various aspects of engineering. Selection was based on academic performance and leadership potential.
The cadets selected represented the multi-ethnic diversity of Afghanistan, U.S. officials said.
The eight-hour-a-day, six-day-a-week schedule held the cadets to an aggressive program that challenged them to interact in every area. The cadets were paired into teams, with each team spending a week each working in the field and in an office environment. All assignments and hands-on training were designed around existing and future Afghan Engineer District construction projects for the Afghan National Army.
"The cadets had many questions, and you answered them", Afghan Col. Hamdullah Yousfzai, dean of education for the National Military Academy Afghanistan, said through a translator.
During their week in the field, cadets visited multiple construction project sites with Afghan Engineer District engineers and construction representatives. The cadets reviewed and compared plans for existing structures to stimulate thought and dialogue, officials said.
The office portion split the week between programs and project management, and engineering. Hands-on practical exercises required the cadets to prepare their own conceptual plan for an Afghan National Army dining facility expansion and upgrade. This was followed by participation in a review of their conceptual design, and walking them through a typical architectural design review.
In addition, the cadets reviewed contractor technical proposals and project scopes of work, assisted in preparing the scope of work for a new contractor, reviewed project design and building of the Afghan National Army dining facility, and were introduced to the operations and maintenance side of facility engineering.
"I think the cadets now understand how properly maintained facilities support their operational mission," said Jeffery B. Wheeler, operations and maintenance program manager for the Afghan National Army.
Getting the cadets to think about architecture from the customer's perspective was one of the challenges.
"I tried to break it down to things they would understand, giving them military terms they can relate to," said Chester Nakamura, architecture team leader. "You have an awesome responsibility designing things for people; ... now they have something to relate to."
(Army Master Sgt. Mark W. Rodgers is assigned to the Afghanistan Engineer District of the Army Corps of Engineers.)
Wednesday, September 05, 2007
Group Gets Injured Troops Back in the Game
By Samantha L. Quigley
American Forces Press Service
Sept. 4, 2007 - A Maryland-based group is out to show severely wounded servicemembers they've still got game through the Wounded Warrior Disabled Sports Project. "The idea for the program is to ... get these guys active as soon as possible while they're there in the hospital, so they can realize they can still be active with their disability," said Kirk Bauer, Disabled Sports USA's executive director.
The Wounded Warrior Disabled Sports Project, created in 2003, is a partnership between Disabled Sports USA and the Wounded Warrior Project. It offers more than 14 sports -- both winter and summer -- and 70 events yearly.
Sports include snow skiing, biking, water skiing, hiking, rock climbing and mountain biking, and a group of veterans recently earned their underwater diving certification.
Disabled Sports USA and the Wounded Warrior Project are both supporters of America Supports You, a Defense Department program connecting citizens and corporations with military personnel and their families serving at home and abroad.
With just a staff of five to work with the Wounded Warrior Disabled Sports Project, Bauer relies on Disabled Sports USA's chapters around the country.
"When (wounded veterans) go skiing, they go skiing with Challenge Aspen or Sun Valley Adaptive Skiing (Idaho) or Breckinridge Outdoor Education Center in Breckinridge, Colo.," Bauer said, citing some examples.
Though Disabled Sports USA's programs are available for any individual with a physical disability, the Wounded Warrior Disabled Sports Project is only for veterans of operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom, Bauer said.
"This particular program, because everything is paid for -- from their transportation to get them there, to hotels, the food, the adaptive equipment, everything -- we're limiting it those who were recently injured," he said. "These are folks that have lost limbs and basically had their life altered from their disability."
Servicemembers participating in the project usually are recovering at one of three major military hospitals: Walter Reed Army Medical Center here; Brooke Army Medical Center at Fort Sam Houston, Texas; and Naval Medical Center San Diego. Bauer said the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., isn't included because sailors and Marines recovering there go to Walter Reed for rehabilitation.
The project also reaches out to those recovering from severe head trauma or spinal cord injuries who are being treated at one of several veterans hospitals specializing in care of those conditions, Bauer said.
"We try to find them were they are," he said. Some of those the group reaches out to are very easy to find. They're sitting at the recovering veterans' bedsides.
"We realize that when the ... warrior is severely injured, the entire family is impacted," Bauer said. "We provide all expenses paid for at least one family member to go with the wounded warrior and learn the sport and actually be a part of that person learning how to water ski, snow ski, whatever they're doing."
That helps eliminate the "deer-in-the-headlights" look he said he so often sees from family members as they try to figure out how to help their loved ones recover, he said.
More than 1,200 veterans and caretakers have benefited from the Wounded Warrior Disabled Sports Project. In a little over a month, that number will grow again. Another chapter in the Disabled Sports USA network, Team River Runner, is taking a group of veterans and their caretakers and heading for the blue waters of the Caribbean.
This is no vacation, though. With a schedule packed full of sea kayaking, camping, swimming and snorkeling there's very little chance these double leg amputees will be sipping drinks with little umbrellas.
"It's not going to be a resort," said Joe Mornini, Team River Runner's executive director. "It's going to be an adventure trip." And one that will help to build confidence and a support network, he added.
American Forces Press Service
Sept. 4, 2007 - A Maryland-based group is out to show severely wounded servicemembers they've still got game through the Wounded Warrior Disabled Sports Project. "The idea for the program is to ... get these guys active as soon as possible while they're there in the hospital, so they can realize they can still be active with their disability," said Kirk Bauer, Disabled Sports USA's executive director.
The Wounded Warrior Disabled Sports Project, created in 2003, is a partnership between Disabled Sports USA and the Wounded Warrior Project. It offers more than 14 sports -- both winter and summer -- and 70 events yearly.
Sports include snow skiing, biking, water skiing, hiking, rock climbing and mountain biking, and a group of veterans recently earned their underwater diving certification.
Disabled Sports USA and the Wounded Warrior Project are both supporters of America Supports You, a Defense Department program connecting citizens and corporations with military personnel and their families serving at home and abroad.
With just a staff of five to work with the Wounded Warrior Disabled Sports Project, Bauer relies on Disabled Sports USA's chapters around the country.
"When (wounded veterans) go skiing, they go skiing with Challenge Aspen or Sun Valley Adaptive Skiing (Idaho) or Breckinridge Outdoor Education Center in Breckinridge, Colo.," Bauer said, citing some examples.
Though Disabled Sports USA's programs are available for any individual with a physical disability, the Wounded Warrior Disabled Sports Project is only for veterans of operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom, Bauer said.
"This particular program, because everything is paid for -- from their transportation to get them there, to hotels, the food, the adaptive equipment, everything -- we're limiting it those who were recently injured," he said. "These are folks that have lost limbs and basically had their life altered from their disability."
Servicemembers participating in the project usually are recovering at one of three major military hospitals: Walter Reed Army Medical Center here; Brooke Army Medical Center at Fort Sam Houston, Texas; and Naval Medical Center San Diego. Bauer said the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., isn't included because sailors and Marines recovering there go to Walter Reed for rehabilitation.
The project also reaches out to those recovering from severe head trauma or spinal cord injuries who are being treated at one of several veterans hospitals specializing in care of those conditions, Bauer said.
"We try to find them were they are," he said. Some of those the group reaches out to are very easy to find. They're sitting at the recovering veterans' bedsides.
"We realize that when the ... warrior is severely injured, the entire family is impacted," Bauer said. "We provide all expenses paid for at least one family member to go with the wounded warrior and learn the sport and actually be a part of that person learning how to water ski, snow ski, whatever they're doing."
That helps eliminate the "deer-in-the-headlights" look he said he so often sees from family members as they try to figure out how to help their loved ones recover, he said.
More than 1,200 veterans and caretakers have benefited from the Wounded Warrior Disabled Sports Project. In a little over a month, that number will grow again. Another chapter in the Disabled Sports USA network, Team River Runner, is taking a group of veterans and their caretakers and heading for the blue waters of the Caribbean.
This is no vacation, though. With a schedule packed full of sea kayaking, camping, swimming and snorkeling there's very little chance these double leg amputees will be sipping drinks with little umbrellas.
"It's not going to be a resort," said Joe Mornini, Team River Runner's executive director. "It's going to be an adventure trip." And one that will help to build confidence and a support network, he added.
Army Boat Supports Dive Teams Trying to Raise Russian Sub
By Spc. Morrene E. Randell, USA
Special to American Forces Press Service
Sept. 4, 2007 - A light breeze rippled over the dark water of Providence Harbor as two divers sank below the water's surface, leaving behind a long trail of air hoses and the sound of their breathing through the radio. Usually a transport vessel, the U.S. Army Vessel New Orleans, Landing Craft Utility 2031, from the 824th Transportation Company (Heavy Boats) is rendering itself as a diving platform for Army and Navy divers attempting to salvage a sunken Russian submarine in Providence Harbor.
The New Orleans is an Army Reserve vessel manned by a crew of soldiers from 143rd Sustainment Command (Expeditionary). It made its way from its home mooring in Tampa, Fla., to Rhode Island on Aug. 15 to take part in the 40-day innovative readiness training mission, a program that allows Defense Department funding, personnel and equipment to support U.S. civilian projects that provide invaluable combat training that would apply to a unit's mission.
"It's nice, because it's an opportunity to get to work together with people we don't normally work with and understand and appreciate what they are doing," Army Chief Warrant Officer 2 Anthony Tartaglia said. The crew "gets training that they can carry on either in their civilian life or in their military career," the New Orleans' vessel master said.
Most people don't know the Army even has boats, or for that matter, why the Army would need them. The New Orleans is one of 35 LCU-2000 series in service and has a crew of 15 to 17 enlisted personnel and two officers and has a berthing of seven staterooms, 17 bunks and one sickbay. Its galley facilities can accommodate a full crew and passengers for two weeks. The boat is 174 feet long and is powered by twin 1,250 horsepower engines that move it at speeds up to 14 knots.
"When there are large ships that can't come into some ports, we will go out to them," Army Chief Warrant Officer 2 Clark Patton, chief engineer of the New Orleans, said. "We also transport materiel and men, as well as help the Navy transport their materiel when needed."
The LCU-2000 series serves the Army by transporting cargo and equipment all over the world, and it supports missions in harbors, inland waterways and the open ocean. The landing craft utility is a shallow-water landing craft capable of reaching beaches in four feet of water with a full load.
At the onset of Operation Iraqi Freedom, the 824th was dispatched to the Persian Gulf, where it served as a diving platform for divers who were clearing oil platforms of explosives. The Rhode Island mission is similar, but far less dangerous.
Beneath the New Orleans lies a Juliet 484 Russian submarine. Army and Navy divers are using the boat's ramp as a platform to survey the sub, which sank earlier this year.
"It sank this April after a particularly nasty nor'easter," Tartaglia explained.
The storm drove a massive wave into the harbor, and because the submarine was modified to include hatches that allow tourists onto the vessel, it was no longer watertight, he said.
Divers have removed the fore and aft visitor hatches and will replace them with dams. This will make the submarine watertight and allow the team to pump water out of one hatch while the other remains open allowing air to enter and causing it to become buoyant and float back to the surface.
"It's in shallow water. ... The deepest part is about 35 feet," Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class William F. Stetson IV, one of the divers, said. "So it's easy to get down to." Stetson is with Mobile Diving Salvage Unit 2 from Little Creek, Va.
The teams of divers have been surveying the sub to come up with the safest and most practical way to raise it. "We're in phase one of a two-part phase mission," Stetson said. "We've connected four wires and hydraulic cords to keep it stable and prevent it from going any further into the channel. (In the second phase), another team will come back and actually raise the sub."
As further insurance to stabilize the sub when it is raised in 2008, four 7,200 pound anchors called "dead men" have been buried in holes 10 feet deep and wide, and they have been attached to the submarine. The anchors also are being used to pull the submarine toward the pier with hopes it will slightly right itself and resurface.
"This is an excellent mission," Sgt. Kristopher Stribbling said. "To get the chance to come out here and dive on a Russian submarine is phenomenal," the Army diver added. "It's a very unique mission being a submarine, so it has all kinds of new knowledge to take back to the unit."
All parties involved agreed that the knowledge acquired from such a unique dive is invaluable. "You don't get to salvage a vessel like this very often," Stetson said.
But for the historians involved in the sub's recovery, it's not just about the salvage training. "We need to preserve it for historical value," Frank Lennon, of the Russian Submarine Museum, said.
Museum officials and locals of Providence aren't the only ones hopeful, however, that the recovery mission will succeed.
"When it comes up, I hope they find that they can restore it, so I can come back and visit it while it's above the water," Stetson said.
(Army Spc. Morrene E. Randell is assigned to the 204th Public Affairs Detachment.)
Special to American Forces Press Service
Sept. 4, 2007 - A light breeze rippled over the dark water of Providence Harbor as two divers sank below the water's surface, leaving behind a long trail of air hoses and the sound of their breathing through the radio. Usually a transport vessel, the U.S. Army Vessel New Orleans, Landing Craft Utility 2031, from the 824th Transportation Company (Heavy Boats) is rendering itself as a diving platform for Army and Navy divers attempting to salvage a sunken Russian submarine in Providence Harbor.
The New Orleans is an Army Reserve vessel manned by a crew of soldiers from 143rd Sustainment Command (Expeditionary). It made its way from its home mooring in Tampa, Fla., to Rhode Island on Aug. 15 to take part in the 40-day innovative readiness training mission, a program that allows Defense Department funding, personnel and equipment to support U.S. civilian projects that provide invaluable combat training that would apply to a unit's mission.
"It's nice, because it's an opportunity to get to work together with people we don't normally work with and understand and appreciate what they are doing," Army Chief Warrant Officer 2 Anthony Tartaglia said. The crew "gets training that they can carry on either in their civilian life or in their military career," the New Orleans' vessel master said.
Most people don't know the Army even has boats, or for that matter, why the Army would need them. The New Orleans is one of 35 LCU-2000 series in service and has a crew of 15 to 17 enlisted personnel and two officers and has a berthing of seven staterooms, 17 bunks and one sickbay. Its galley facilities can accommodate a full crew and passengers for two weeks. The boat is 174 feet long and is powered by twin 1,250 horsepower engines that move it at speeds up to 14 knots.
"When there are large ships that can't come into some ports, we will go out to them," Army Chief Warrant Officer 2 Clark Patton, chief engineer of the New Orleans, said. "We also transport materiel and men, as well as help the Navy transport their materiel when needed."
The LCU-2000 series serves the Army by transporting cargo and equipment all over the world, and it supports missions in harbors, inland waterways and the open ocean. The landing craft utility is a shallow-water landing craft capable of reaching beaches in four feet of water with a full load.
At the onset of Operation Iraqi Freedom, the 824th was dispatched to the Persian Gulf, where it served as a diving platform for divers who were clearing oil platforms of explosives. The Rhode Island mission is similar, but far less dangerous.
Beneath the New Orleans lies a Juliet 484 Russian submarine. Army and Navy divers are using the boat's ramp as a platform to survey the sub, which sank earlier this year.
"It sank this April after a particularly nasty nor'easter," Tartaglia explained.
The storm drove a massive wave into the harbor, and because the submarine was modified to include hatches that allow tourists onto the vessel, it was no longer watertight, he said.
Divers have removed the fore and aft visitor hatches and will replace them with dams. This will make the submarine watertight and allow the team to pump water out of one hatch while the other remains open allowing air to enter and causing it to become buoyant and float back to the surface.
"It's in shallow water. ... The deepest part is about 35 feet," Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class William F. Stetson IV, one of the divers, said. "So it's easy to get down to." Stetson is with Mobile Diving Salvage Unit 2 from Little Creek, Va.
The teams of divers have been surveying the sub to come up with the safest and most practical way to raise it. "We're in phase one of a two-part phase mission," Stetson said. "We've connected four wires and hydraulic cords to keep it stable and prevent it from going any further into the channel. (In the second phase), another team will come back and actually raise the sub."
As further insurance to stabilize the sub when it is raised in 2008, four 7,200 pound anchors called "dead men" have been buried in holes 10 feet deep and wide, and they have been attached to the submarine. The anchors also are being used to pull the submarine toward the pier with hopes it will slightly right itself and resurface.
"This is an excellent mission," Sgt. Kristopher Stribbling said. "To get the chance to come out here and dive on a Russian submarine is phenomenal," the Army diver added. "It's a very unique mission being a submarine, so it has all kinds of new knowledge to take back to the unit."
All parties involved agreed that the knowledge acquired from such a unique dive is invaluable. "You don't get to salvage a vessel like this very often," Stetson said.
But for the historians involved in the sub's recovery, it's not just about the salvage training. "We need to preserve it for historical value," Frank Lennon, of the Russian Submarine Museum, said.
Museum officials and locals of Providence aren't the only ones hopeful, however, that the recovery mission will succeed.
"When it comes up, I hope they find that they can restore it, so I can come back and visit it while it's above the water," Stetson said.
(Army Spc. Morrene E. Randell is assigned to the 204th Public Affairs Detachment.)
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