Afghanistan: Kentucky Guard member, former Navy Seabee uses experiences, skills to get the job done

By Army National Guard Staff Sgt. Paul Evans
Kentucky Agribusiness Development Team 4

Spc. Michael Hilario, a member of the 149th Vertical Engineering Detachment, 201st Engineer Battalion deployed with the Kentucky National Guard's Agribusiness Development Team 4, measures wood before cutting it May 3, 2012 in southern Afghanistan. Hilario was helping to build hardened structures to make life more comfortable for ADT 4, and eventually ADT 5 as well. (Army National Guard photo by Staff Sgt. Paul Evans)
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FORWARD OPERATING BASE PASAB, Afghanistan, July 25, 2012 - A former Navy Seabee who now serves with the Kentucky Army National Guard, is putting his old skills to work as part of an agribusiness development team in Afghanistan.

“No matter what we have to go through and the hard things we have to deal with, to be able to know that you’re here to help others, it’s a way of life just because it’s the way I was raised,” said Army Spc. Michael Hilario, who is deployed with the Kentucky National Guard’s Agribusiness Development Team 4.

Back in Kentucky, Hilario has been serving as an electrician with the 149th Vertical Engineering Detachment, 201st Engineer Battalion since leaving the Navy Reserve in 2008. During his 10 years with the Navy, Hilario deployed to Iraq twice as a Seabee, earning the Seabee Combat Warfare device and Fleet Marine Force Ribbon.

“I was active for right at two years,” he said. “I was on the USS Kittyhawk for a little bit, and the USS Antietam out west in California, [then] I was out of the service for a very short period of time and wanted to get back into the Seabees.

“I’m a general contractor; that’s what I do best, so I got with the Seabees and went to Ramadi, Fallujah and Baghdad, [where] we built airstrips, medevac hospitals, schools. It’s quite a good feeling to know you can go over and help people like that,” Hilario said about his ten years with a navy construction battalion.

In Afghanistan, Hilario – who has been an electrician for over 18 years – has put his past as a Seabee to good use by helping with the agribusiness development team’s construction projects and serving as a liaison with the Seabees here.

“Things that we’ve needed, I’ve been able to go over and obtain,” he said. “The things that they’ve needed, I’ve been able to help them as well. It’s brotherhood taking care of brotherhood here. It’s all family. … I believe in helping others. That’s the way I was raised.”

“It’s pretty evident that he knows how to do electric work pretty good,” said Army Master Sgt. John Black, a supervisor to Hilario on construction projects. “He’s [also] a jack of all trades.”

Hilario said service is in his bloodlines, as his father retired from the Navy as a chief petty officer, and his grandfather was a master chief petty officer.

“I wanted to be a part of the agribusiness development team because I knew they were doing some good things here,” he said.

Hilario has three children at home, and two of them are teenagers who have had to learn to deal with his deployments.

“My oldest two – Britney, 21, Michael, 18 – they’ve been through it a couple of times. They know it’s hard, but they’re military children,” he said. “It’s gotten hard the first couple of times, but now they’re understanding how things are, what we’re here for, what we’re here to do, and they know this is part of daddy’s life as well as theirs.”

His youngest child is almost 3, he said, and isn’t old enough yet to understand. “I’m sure the video I sent him made him aware -- let him know where dad’s going,” he said. “He’ll look back on it in the years to come. We’ll sit down and we’ll talk about it too.”

After this deployment, Hilario said he will probably go home for a couple months and take it easy, but adds he’ll be glad to return if necessary.

“If they need me back, I’d go back again,” he said. “I wouldn’t hesitate.”

Helping people is a family tradition, Hilario said.

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