Photo By Lt. Col. John Reynolds | Staff Sgt. Brad Porter, 711th TC (Seaport Ops) noncommissioned officer in charge,...... read more read more
CONCORD, Calif. - Soldiers of the 311th Expeditionary Sustainment Command participated in the War Reserves Stockpile for Allies, Korea operation at the Military Ocean Terminal Concord Aug. 18 through Sept. 12.
WARSA-Korea is an operation where war-fighting material held in reserve in pre-positioned storage to be used if needed in wartime is transported from Korea to several locations across the United States to either be repacked or destroyed.
Motor transport operators, transportation management coordinators and cargo specialists from the 711th Transportation Company (Seaport Ops), 238th TC and 380th Transportation Detachment worked in conjunction with naval personnel to ensure the safe transport of the munitions.
“We have trained specifically for these types of operations, but all cargo operations are dangerous regardless of what type of cargo is being handled,” said Staff Sgt. Brad Porter, 711th TC (Seaport Ops) noncommissioned officer in charge. “This mission ensures that our nation’s ability to support the war-fighter mission can continue.”
During this retrograde ammunition operation, the sensitive cargo was transported from the Republic of Korea aboard the Motor Vessel Black Eagle in 1,075 twenty-foot ocean-shipping containers containing more than 10,000 tons of WRSA-K ammunition.
To understand the dangers of this operation is to know what happened at the Naval Ammunition Depot, Port Chicago on July 17, 1944. This was the scene of a massive ammunition detonation, which took the lives of over 300 persons, destroyed two cargo ships and wrecked or damaged structures at a considerable distance from the blast.
“If there are no accidents, injuries, loss of life or explosions, and if the ship leaves port on time, and all of the munitions leave MOTCO as planned, the mission is a success,” said Porter. “It is important to remove the munitions from countries we have a SOFA agreement with, and it is important to remove degraded ammo when it has reached its end life status.”
The U.S. Forces WRSA-Korea retrograde initiative is a congressionally sponsored program that allows outdated and excess ammunition stored in Korea to be shipped back to the United States, where it will be recycled or destroyed.
This is an important operation because the WRSA-Korea initiative will save the United States millions of dollars on storage, inventory and accounting for ammunition that is no longer needed or useful in the Korean theater.
The Military Ocean Terminal Concord is a military base established in 1942 north of the city of Concord, California, at the shore of the Sacramento River where it widens into Suisun Bay. The station is an armament storage depot, supplying ships at Port Chicago, processing and shipping thousands of tons of materiel out across the Pacific Ocean.
The United States' Department of Defense maintains war reserve stocks around the world, mainly in NATO countries and in some major non-NATO allies like Korea.
| Date Taken: | 09.10.2014 |
| Date Posted: | 09.23.2014 11:39 |
| Story ID: | 143011 |
| Location: | CONCORD, CALIFORNIA, US |
| Web Views: | 237 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
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