The 835th Transportation Battalion continues to find innovative solutions to solve unusual port operations problems at White Beach in Okinawa, Japan.

Because the USNS Sgt. Matej Kocak was damaged in an incident at sea Jan. 22 shortly after it left Okinawa, it had to return to White Beach for repairs and could not complete its journey. Therefore, the 835th Trans. Bn. had to offload cargo from the ship Feb. 9-12 that they had just uploaded Jan. 20-21, while salvage and repair teams continued initial work on the ship that they had begun at sea.

This is when the 835th transportation specialists encountered a new set of problems with cargo discharge.

The 835th had already learned on the earlier upload that White Beach Pier bollards lack the strength to support the weight of the ship, and the configuration of the Kocak's stern ramp is such that it cannot be lowered onto the White Beach pier.

"The pier itself would not support a roll-on, roll-off operation, and the helos on the ship could not get up to the weather deck to use ship's cranes, so we had to figure out how to do a ro/ro operation when we didn't have the pier capacity," Raymond Brown, 835th distribution management chief said.

"Helicopters that had earlier been stowed below decks through the stern ramp in Hawaii could not be brought up to the weather deck for offload because the pitch of the internal ship's ramps was too steep for such large and expensive equipment," added Lt. Col. Charles Novotny, 835th Trans. Bn. commander.

"Among possible courses of action considered when planning to offload the ship was the use of causeways or a barge for offload. The cost of using a barge was much less than using the causeway, by about $1 million," said Novotny.

"Time was also a factor," Novotny added. "We needed to get the cargo off as soon as possible because of the damage to the ship. The barge was both a timesaver and a dollar saver."

The battalion rented the barge and a tracked shore crane with which to offload helicopters and other equipment that could not be taken up to the weather deck for offload via ship's cranes.

A built-up platform and the shore crane on board the barge provided stability during the offload.

"Because of the difference in height between the barge and the stern ramp, we built a platform on the barge to support the stern ramp," Brown said. "Once we erected that and leveled it, we lowered the stern ramp to make a level platform.

"Given the distance from the ramp to the pier side we used the heaviest crane possible to lift the critical cargo that could not be driven up the internal ramps to the weather deck," Novotny said.

"The crane was about five feet or so below the stern ramp, but because of its capacity, it could grab cargo and bring it ashore safely. We normally don't use that type of tracked crane on the
pier; we use wheeled cranes, but this type is more heavy-duty," Brown added.

Brown said form followed function in the design of the barge's platform.

"The platform size was determined by the ship's requirements of what the platform needed to be, and the salvage barge foreman and me doing the measurements of the freeboard to determine what size we could make it," he said.

"Afterward we just set the ramp on the platform. Because the ramp is so heavy, and both the barge and ship were moored to the pier, it didn't shift more than a foot or so fore and aft or port and starboard," Brown added.

In addition to using the ramp, ship's cranes simultaneously offloaded cargo that was located on or could be moved to the weather decks.

"Using the barge and platform was just an idea that came to us because the ship had to be discharged in unusual circumstances. At the end of the day you have to get the job done," said Brown.

Salvage and repair teams and the transportation specialists worked together to ensure the cargo was offloaded and the ship was repaired.

"We had an agreement where we would work during the day and the salvage and repair teams would work at night unless something critical came up," Novotny said.

After they had offloaded all cargo and equipment from the Kocak, the 835th transloaded it onto the USNS Pfc. Eugene A. Obregon, the Kocak's sister ship, which was en route to White Beach. The cargo was then able to resume its journey to other Pacific Pathways exercises.