MTMC moves Far East cargoes during port closure.

With the nation's West Coast ports closed due to a recent work stoppage, the Military Traffic Management Command moved boldly to ensure the movement of Department of Defense supplies to the Far East.

MTMC's ammunition port of Concord, Calif., was transformed into a freight-handling terminal for shipments to Pacific Rim locations.

Some 900 containers--mostly 40-foot ocean varieties--were trucked into huge holding areas at the military port operated by the 834th Transportation Battalion. MTMC's industry partners, including big ocean carriers like APL and Maersk-Sealand and members of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, worked in close partnership at the MTMC staging areas and container loading area at Concord Naval Weapons Station, in the Greater San Francisco Bay area.

"We're the only terminal currently working on the West Coast," said Lt. Col. Terry Basham, commander.

The union-management contract dispute, which forced the extraordinary MTMC effort, began Sept. 27, when the Pacific Maritime Association ordered 29 ports along the West Coast closed. Concern began at once for Department of Defense cargoes destined for Hawaii, Alaska, Guam, Okinawa, Japan and Korea, which are normally handled by commercial firms.

As the work stoppage lengthened, the crisis became more acute for MTMC with no Department of Defense cargoes moving. Caught in the stoppage were a wide variety of cargoes for American military and DoD civilian customers, which included commissary stocks, household goods and military shipments.

Based on Military Shipper requirements, MTMC swung into action. On Oct. 2, cargo began moving to Concord as the designated shipping point for the goods. With the size of the task, Basham asked for help from the Army Reserve's nearby 1397th Transportation Terminal Brigade, Mare Island, Calif.

"To avoid delay in getting our folks in place, we simply performed the first day's duty in lieu of our scheduled weekend drill for October," said Maj. Mike Donnelly, who left his duties as a state air quality control specialist in Sacramento.

Within 24 hours, 19 Reservists had reported for duty. They found plenty of work--cabs pulling trailers of containers with Department of Defense cargoes from ports at Tracey, Lathrop, Stockton, Richmond, and others were steadily arriving.

While the work stoppage continued at the commercial ports, blocking all ocean shipments on the West Coast, a neutral work environment developed at the Concord installation. Longshoremen and shipping company officials worked in harmony with MTMC military and civilian workers to prepare the overseas cargoes.

Two days later, MTMC got a big break. The informal union-management working agreement to move military cargoes was expanded to include consumable cargoes to Alaska and Hawaii--from commercial ports. The MTMC facility arranged for the movement of Guam cargo movement to Hawaii, and coordinated with the Military Sealift Command for a charter vessel to relay the cargo to Guam.

The results were fast breaking.

On Oct. 5, as container-laden trucks entered the Concord port with cargoes for Okinawa, Japan and Korea, other empty trucks arrived to retrieve containers for Alaska, Hawaii and Guam.

In the documentation area, there was a swirl of activity. Drivers arrived with and without documentation. Reservists, often Spanish speaking to accommodate the many Hispanic drivers, opened sealed containers of frustrated trucks to search for proper paperwork.

Members of the 834th and Reservists worked double shifts to keep up with the workload.

For transportation assistant Millie Diaz, work was managing a huge pile of paper documents that depicted arriving cargoes. Meanwhile, in a crowded office nearby, a joint MTMC-Reserve team carefully entered data into an electronic form within the Worldwide Port System.

"Work is a constant," said Staff Sgt. Brenda Fleming, staring intently at a Worldwide Port System monitor. "As soon as we can verify a container is loaded, we enter it into the system."

Challenges were many.

A request for a commercial vessel to move the containers brought no takers. A U.S. Maritime vessel, the Cape Henry, berthed in nearby San Francisco, was designated to carry the first load of cargo. As the Hawaii commercial service resumed and cargo for Guam could be sent to Hawaii and relayed forward to Guam, another RRF vessel being activated was cancelled.

MTMC's plan called for the Cape Henry to carry all the DoD containers on a voyage that would include stops in the ports of Yokohama, Japan; Naha, Japan; and Pusan, Korea.

The reality of automated capacity calculations versus actual, usable space was not long in coming. As container tracks rumbled in and out of the documentation area Oct. 5, a grim group of shipping officials met with 834th members and Reservists and worked out the problems with loading forty-foot containers on the RO/RO vessel.

"We had to push the envelope as far as we could without sacrificing safety," said Basham.

Resolution came quickly.

The Cape Henry arrived at the Concord pier on the evening of Oct. 7. The following day, after contractors built a huge wooden timber support platform, the long stem ramp of the Cape Henry touched the concrete ammunition pier of Concord.

Simultaneous loading of containers on the Cape Henry via stem ramp and container crane began at once.

In a steady stream, row upon row of containers filled the topside and inner holds of the vessel.

The Cape Henry sailed for the Far East on Oct. 13. The vessel made the following deliveries before returning home: Yokohama, Oct. 27; Okinawa, Oct. 30; and Pusan, Nov. 1.

Just days before, the West Coast work stoppage ended when a federal court ordered ports to reopen for an 80-day cooling-off period under the Taft-Hartley Act.

The remaining containers at Concord were moved by commercial shipping firms to area ports for overseas shipment. In the main, the shifted Department of Defense cargoes received priority handling in the West Coast's commercial ports--already saddled with a backlog of 10 weeks of cargo and more than 200 ships awaiting attention.

If there was a fitting compliment to MTMC for its extraordinary efforts, it came Oct. 8 from reporter Joseph Giordono, of Pacific Stars & Stripes.

After hearing of the prodigious efforts to move the Department of Defense cargoes, Giordono said, "The people here will be very glad to hear this news."

John Randt
MTMC Headquarters Alexandria