HUNTER ARMY AIRFIELD, Ga. - The 23rd Chemical Battalion out of Fort Lewis, Wash., conducted a Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear platoon executive evaluation for the 92nd Chemical Company, 3rd Sustainment Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division. This training exercise was conducted in order to prepare the Company to assume a Prepare-to-Deploy mission in the CENTCOM Area of Responsibility.
Soldiers of the 92nd Chemical Company convened at the container yard to conduct reconnaissance and decontamination of the yard, March 18.
Armed with the Multi-ray detector and the Joint Chemical Agent Detector, Staff Sgt. Michael Duncan, Spc. Nicholas Vandal and Pfc. Royce Ebanal moved diligently through the yard to identify the presence of hazardous chemical or explosives.
"The Multi-ray is used to read the oxygen level and also used to identify explosives while the JCAD (Joint Chemical Agent Detector), as the name implies is used to detect the presence of chemicals," said Maj. Jason Kerr. "With this equipment, they are able to detect hazardous material and then they send the information up to the Incident Commander."
The training exercise was conducted in two phases. Phase one had the 1st Platoon, under the supervision of 1st Lt. Johanna Miller, performing a reconnaissance to confirm or deny the presence of contamination in the Container Yard. Phase two was handled by the 4th Platoon, led by 1st Lt. Brittany Greene. Their mission was to perform field site decontamination on a contaminated CONEX in the container yard.
Phase one involved giving a quick and organized assessment of hazard that could possibly keep personnel from conducting their mission.
"Our job is to keep people safe from any type of Chemical, Biological, Radiological or nuclear hazard," said 1st Lt. Miller. "I have Soldiers who are motivated and focused on keeping everyone safe. We are constantly adapting to different situations, and at the end of the day we go home knowing that we are keeping Soldiers mission focused."
In the second phase, the Soldiers convened to determine what the safe distance was so that they could start the decontamination process.
After establishing a staging area for their vehicles and equipments, they sprayed down the contaminated CONEX.
Due to the possibility of self-contamination, decontamination was performed on the Reconnaissance and Decontamination team members who came into close contact with the contaminated CONEX.
"I definitely recommend this type of training to be continued," said Staff Sgt. Duncan.
"It is good for me. I've only being with the unit for about three weeks, so this is my first time working with the unit and my Soldiers in an exercise of this magnitude. It definitely gave me and my Soldiers an opportunity to get out there and work as a team and get into the groove of what we do here in Chemical. We got to know what our strengths and weaknesses are."
The training exercise culminated with the 92nd Chemical Company conducting Hazardous Response Program Operations at the Port of Savannah on March 20.
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