Photo By Melissa Buckley | Staff Sgt. Armando Trujillo, from the 58th Transportation Battalion, drives the Marine...... read more read more
FORT LEONARD WOOD, Mo. — Imagine backing up a vehicle through a winding serpentine of cones with precision-perfect accuracy — now, try it in a 35,000-pound 18-wheeler. That is just one of the challenges 16 competitors had to negotiate during the 58th Transportation Battalion’s 8th Annual Joint Service Truck Rodeo Friday at Training Area 228.
Each service that teaches motor transport operators on post — Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines — send four instructors to represent their branch. According to organizers, the competition is designed to showcase the instructors’ technical expertise behind the wheel through friendly competition.
This year’s winning team, earning the title of “Victors of the Road,” came from the Navy’s Center for Seabees and Facilities Engineering Detachment Fort Leonard Wood — Petty Officers 1st Class Daniel Morris, Jeff Reaves and Michael Swan, and Petty Officer 2nd Class Justin Sobieralski.
“Congratulations to the Navy on their win. They earned it,” said Sgt. 1st Class Ernest Haefner, this year’s transporter awarded for having the most individual points.
Haefner is an instructor for the 58th Transportation Battalion’s Motor Transport Operator Course, where he teaches new Soldiers the military occupational specialty of 88M Motor Transport Operator. He has been driving professionally for 23 years.
“I was a commercial driver seven years before the Army and have been an 88M for over 16 years,” Haefner said.
Sgt. 1st Class Michael Kovac, one of this year’s event organizers, is also an instructor at the U.S. Army Transportation School’s MTOC. He said each branch designs an event based off their own instruction — his favorite event to watch this year was the Air Force’s forward drive and reverse serpentine challenge in a sleeper cab tractor trailer.
“It looks easy driving forward but taking that trailer in reverse is like trying to take a grocery store cart backwards through cones. If you want to go left, you have to push the back end to the right,” Kovac said. “It is a tricky event.”
The Navy’s challenge included parallel parking a MK31 Medium Tactical Vehicle Replacement tractor trailer. The Army’s challenge was to back a M915 tractor trailer through a 90-degree turn. The Marines set up a question mark-shaped alley through which competitors had to back a Medium Tactical Vehicle Replacement with a MK593 cargo trailer.
The teams took turns rotating through the events, meaning the drivers had to show proficiency in operating other branch’s vehicles.
“Operating in another service’s vehicle adds a level of difficulty because the maneuver has to be executed in a vehicle they are unfamiliar with,” Kovac said. “These instructors have to be able to take their skills and efficiently apply them to any vehicle in any situation.”
Haefner said learning about other vehicles, “is a rare opportunity — an excellent opportunity for everyone.”
According to Kovac, competitions like this are important because they build joint-service relationships.
“We have to be able to speak each other’s lingo. If we build these relationships now, it will make missions we will face in the future more successful. When we are working together on the battlefield, we will already have that bond and it won’t be like we are speaking foreign languages,” Kovac said. “At the end of the day, we all joined the military for the same reasons — to protect our country and better ourselves. We just took different paths. We are one family.”
Haefner said instructors thinking about competing in the truck rodeo next year should take the unique opportunity.
“This event enables you to be a multi-platform, multi-functional operator. The team comradery among the squads made it all worth it. This opportunity has only been available to me while serving at Fort Leonard Wood.”
| Date Taken: | 09.22.2023 |
| Date Posted: | 10.04.2023 08:55 |
| Story ID: | 455023 |
| Location: | FORT LEONARD WOOD, MISSOURI, US |
| Web Views: | 23 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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