The executive officer of the 840th Distribution Deployment Support Battalion examines a cargo container at Logistics Support Area (LSA) Anaconda in Iraq.

The executive officer of the 840th Distribution Deployment Support Battalion examines a cargo container at Logistics Support Area (LSA) Anaconda in Iraq. The battalion has been tracking down borrowed commercial cargo containers and replacing them with Government-owned containers, thereby saving millions of dollars in monthly detention charges, or late fees, assessed by commercial carriers. Because not enough Army-owned containers were available to deploy all the equipment needed for Operation Iraqi Freedom 1, commercial cargo carriers loaned containers to the Army. After a grace period, the carriers started charging the detention fees. When the battalion arrived at LSA Anaconda last year, these fees were running over $10 million a month. Using a Web-based program called Container Management Software Tool and battalion inventorying teams augmented by personnel from the 184th Transportation Company, Mississippi Army National Guard, the battalion found many of the carrier-owned containers. In January, detention charges were down to $377,880 for all of Iraq.