Pennsylvania National Guard mobilizes for Hurricane Sandy

News: Pennsylvania National Guard mobilizes for Hurricane Sandy

109th Mobile Public Affairs Detachment

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Sgt. Coltin Heller

Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett, listens to Lt. Col. Larry Dugan, commander of the 728th Combat Sustainment Support Battalion, as he introduces the staff operating in the tactical operations center during Operation Sandy, located in area 13 on Fort Indiantown Gap, Oct. 30, 2012. The Soldier's operating the TOC, managed and coordinated the unit's which loaded and distributed the supplies coming in from the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Center. Corbett, a former guardsman, took special interest in the effort. "That's what I did in 1972, when Hurricane Agnes came through," he said, speaking of the support effort. "It shows citizen-soldiers working to help the state, as well as the entire nation."(U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Coltin Heller, 109th Mobile Public Affairs Detachment)

FORT INDIANTOWN GAP, Pa.– With Pennsylvania National Guard units across the state mobilizing in response to Hurricane Sandy, soldiers and airmen inside the Joint Emergency Operations Center, located on Fort Indiantown Gap, work around the clock.
The JEOC, comprised of several different sections, monitors not only Hurricane Sandy, but the movement of guard members, equipment, and supplies by various task forces across the state during Operation Sandy.

“First we go out to all the units that are going to be part of our task forces; east, west, south, etc,” said Master Sgt. John Mauser, senior logistics noncommissioned officer with Joint Force Headquarters. “[Then] they send in reports of what equipment they have on hand, what’s down and what’s available for use.”
“Then we also coordinate that everyone is fed, and we have to coordinate whether they are being fed here on Fort Indiantown Gap or through regular Army meals like MREs or they go through vendors,” said the Lykens, Pa. native.

“Also we get the barracks for people who need to stay here like fire fighters or other units that come. Anyone who comes here, we give them buildings to stay. We are pretty much taking care of them from getting fed to getting a bath and getting to bed, ” added Mauser.

With tropical storms and hurricanes, there is always room for learning and educating, as he has continued to find in his nearly 15 years of experience, Mauser said.

“When we come in here for a snow storm it is totally different equipment than a flood, but when we come in for a flood, I already have a sense of the equipment that we are going to need,” he said.

On the logistics side, real world worst-case scenarios are practiced that help prepare guard members and civilian first responders for state-emergencies like Hurricane Sandy, added Mauser.

Inside the JEOC, the Pennsylvania Army National Guard and Air National Guard work in tandem, coordinating relief efforts in response to Hurricane Sandy.

“I’m actually coordinating the use of Air National Guard assets into the greater response of the Joint Emergency Operations Center to respond to taskings across the state,” said Lt. Col. Kris Kollar, Air National Guard Liaison officer to the JEOC.

“The Army and Air National Guard can bring both similar and separate skill sets… We have a team here in the JEOC to help distribute information to each of the Air National Guard Wings, gather their capabilities and their response time, and push it back here to the JEOC leadership; so they can make decisions if they are going to use an Army asset or Air National Guard asset independently or merge them together for a joint response in a specific issue,” said Kollar, who calls Lebanon, Pa. home.

An example of one of the separate skill sets that the Air Guard brings are the Red Horse units, added Kollar.

“Those Red Horse units are the Air Force heavy combat construction engineers, so they have a lot of capabilities for building stuff as well as moving a lot of debris,” he said. “Our Red Horse assets can be a tremendous response force here in this type of emergency as we expect potential damage from wind to power lines and roads that need to be cleared.”

Meanwhile, on the Army aviation side of the house, Col. Todd Levendoski, acting state Army aviation officer and commander of the eastern Army National Guard aviation training site, said working at the aviation desk of the JEOC has given him a different perspective.

“Last year I was the deputy task force of aviation commander working with Col. David Wood, who is the combat aviation brigade commander, and we conducted aviation operations to support the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,” Levondoski, a Lebanon, Pa. native said.

For the Army aviation side, last year’s storm was a good lesson in what areas they lacked.

“At the time the biggest thing was getting current information from the people on the ground,” Levendoski said. “And, now with the new 800 megahertz radios, we should be able to communicate with ground first responders to the aircraft. There won’t be a lack of communication.”

For Kollar, it’s using all the assets or tools in the Governor’s and the Adjutant General’s toolkit to bring to bear in a disaster and a civil response for Pennsylvania, he said. But, it also goes beyond the mission in times like this.

“It’s an honor to be able to help our citizenry, and to take care of the people,” he said. “It’s what we do and what we train on a daily basis.”

“We have a war-time mission and a state-side mission. And, doing this really helps show the hard-work come to fruition. You never want to see this stuff happen but when it does you want to be able to exercise your skills to provide for the citizens of the state and take care of our people and everything.”