Charleston Docks Serve as ``Rehab Hospital'' for Equipment Used in Global War on Terrorism; Army Unit Gets Equipment Back in Shape, Action.

CHARLESTON, S.C. -- Army mechanics on the docks in Charleston, South Carolina hear the tales of desert fighting from the likes of Humvees, tanks, generators and tanker trucks.

Months into Operation Enduring Freedom, the Combat Equipment Group-Afloat (CEG-A) at the Naval Weapons Station near Charleston, S.C. continues to provide equipment and supplies to soldiers overseas. The facility is part of an overall "jointness" strategy by U.S. military to save time and costs, speed efficiency and get supplies to overseas fronts as quickly as possible.

Row after row of wreckers, tankers, trucks, Humvees and generators are lined up at the government-owned, contractor-operated logistic facility, called CEG-A. Some need mechanical work while others are marked with white chalk, awaiting camouflage paint jobs. A row of Humvees is particularly damaged. One common problem is, of course, wind-blown sand wedged into every imaginable mechanical part.

CEG-A is one of four Army Preposition Sites (APS) in the world, set up to provide US soldiers the ability to quickly access combat equipment and supplies at any government-designated location. All four of these facilities inspect, repair, calibrate, service and modify equipment to reconstitute Army pre-positioned stocks.

The facility's maintenance shops hum as mechanics service, modernize and maintain forklifts, bulldozers, heavy equipment transporters, and Reverse Osmosis Water Purification Units. "Just about everything you need to operate a city," said Col. Douglas Glover, Commander of CEG-A's US Army Materiel Command.

The difference between the other three sites and CEG-A is that the Charleston-based operation is the only afloat program. After readying equipment and supplies, CEG-A stows them on 950-foot Navy cargo ships, which then sail to different parts of the world.

These ships--Large, Medium-Speed, Roll-On/Roll-Off ships (LMSRs)--go out to sea for 30 months. If there is a need for the equipment and supplies, such as a military incident or humanitarian effort, the cargo is unloaded. After 30 months, a ship returns to CEG-A, where its equipment is downloaded for maintenance or repairs and then uploaded once again.

Since July 2002, CEG-A has downloaded six LMSRs, two supply ships and a portion of one ammunition ship--approximately 8,580 pieces of rolling stock (tanks, artillery pieces, and trucks), 5,833 containers of supplies and 1,173 containers of ammunition. These supplies were provided to war-fighting units, allowing them to conduct their movements into Iraq.

Col. Glover said pre-positioned stocks provided a significant amount of the combat equipment used by the Army during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Specifically, afloat stocks accounted for one-third of the APS combat equipment and three-fourths of the APS support equipment utilized in the war effort.