Army Reserve technicians help keep WAREX on ‘The Road to Awesome’

Photo By Russell Toof | Paul Bettit, a heavy mobile equipment repairman at the U.S. Army Reserve's equipment concentration site 27 at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, New Jersey, works on a High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle. Mechanics at ECS 27 are busy preparing vehicles and equipment for the 78th Training Division's Warrior Exercise, happening later this month.  

JOINT BASE MCGUIRE-DIX-LAKEHURST, NEW JERSEY, UNITED STATES

04.18.2017

Story by Staff Sgt. Shawn Morris 

99th Readiness Division

JOINT BASE MCGUIRE-DIX-LAKEHUSRT, N.J. – When nearly 60 units from the U.S. Army Reserve, U.S. Army, U.S. Air Force and Canadian Armed Forces arrived here in March for Warrior Exercise 78-17-01, they needed vehicles and equipment with which to train.

Enter the Army Reserve’s 99th Regional Support Command, whose Equipment Concentration Sites serviced and issued more than 750 pieces of equipment in support of WAREX to include vehicles, radios and weapons.

“ECSs support equipment training requirements for the entire Army Reserve, and sometimes outside agencies like the active Army, National Guard, Marines and other Department of Defense organizations,” explained William Barbour, supervisory equipment specialist with the 99th RSC’s Directorate of Logistics. “We ensure equipment is properly maintained to its standard degree of readiness in order to meet mobilization and training objectives.

“Also, thousands of dollars were saved by our ECSs having equipment available so that units did not have to ship their equipment from home station,” Barbour added. The 99th RSC’s nine ECSs provide secure locations to store and maintain unit equipment that cannot be stored at unit locations.

As a large-scale collective training event designed to assess units' combat capabilities as America's Army Reserve, the WAREX helps build the most capable, combat-ready, and lethal federal reserve force in the history of the nation through real-world simulations.

Attaining this goal lies in leadership, energy and execution, the three keys to "The Road to Awesome" as identified by Lieutenant General Charles D. Luckey, Chief of Army Reserve and Commanding General, U.S. Army Reserve Command.

Several Soldiers attending WAREX also received real-world training at the 99th RSC’s Area Maintenance Support Activity here, where Soldiers repaired equipment ranging from heaters to FMTVs alongside civilian mechanics. The 99th RSC operates more than two-dozen AMSAs where dual-status technicians service and repair units’ vehicles, small arms, communications-electronics gear, engineering and other equipment, as well as Army watercraft.

In order to provide this same hands-on training opportunity throughout the year, the 99th RSC is partnering with units located throughout its 13-state region as part of the command’s new Maintenance Sustainment and Readiness Program.

The program gives Army Reserve Soldiers the opportunity to perform maintenance tasks at the 99th RSC’s AMSAs and ECSs in order to increase skill proficiency and enhance unit readiness.

“I’m providing the opportunity of utilizing my assets, the ECSs and the AMSA shops, to make more deployable assets – that’s the whole design of the program,” explained Maj. Gen. Troy D. Kok, commanding general of the 99th RSC. “I’m a provider; I support commands in creating readiness.”

Commanders and training NCOs interested in obtaining more information or participating in the 99th RSC’s Maintenance Sustainment and Readiness Program should contact Christopher Miller at [e-mail] or [phone].

• Date Taken: 04.18.2017
• Date Posted: 04.19.2017 14:48
• Story ID: 230853
• Location: JOINT BASE MCGUIRE-DIX-LAKEHURST, NEW JERSEY, US