PEARL HARBOR, Hawaii –
The 599th Transportation Brigade teamed up with Fleet Logistics Center Pearl Harbor, Military Sealift Command, and the 25th Infantry Division to conduct Pacific Pathways port operations here Jan 6-8.
Members of the 599th Trans. Bde. headquarters staff and a deployment and distribution management team (DDMT) from the Guam Detachment and the 836th Transportation Battalion stationed at Yokohama North Dock, Japan, made up the 599th element of the load-out team.
Twenty-four hour port operations enabled the team and contractors to move more than 300 pieces of cargo and equipment in just two days.
""The operations at FLC-Pearl Harbor in support of Pacific Pathways15-1 loadout of task force equipment was a multi-agency port operation with different services and agencies involved. Everyone strived to achieve success in a complex and challenging operation," said John Manahane, 599th traffic management specialist.
Pedro "Pete" Lujan, acting Guam Detachment chief, agreed.
"Good coordination is the key to a successful load out in an operation with so many actors and moving parts," Lujan said.
James Luxemburg, 836th Transportation Battalion information technology specialist, said technical problems were solved before the operation began.
"We knew that our scanners were not compatible with Pearl Harbor's system the last time, so we brought our own equipment and connected through our D-GATES (Deployable Global Air Transportation Execution System) system in Yokohama. We worked that out Monday before the main part of the move," he said.
Elizabeth Jimenez, supervisory transport specialist at FLC-PH, had praise for the DDMT's work.
"It's great to have the DDMT here. We do a lot more of our cargo documentation electronically since they have been coming. We used to do hand scanning and manual, but now we have gone away from manual. The DDMT is used to working with D-GATES, where we were not," she said.
With 24-hour operations, part of the 599th element had to work the graveyard shift.
Gregory Pangelinan, transportation tech from the Guam Detachment, documented cargo throughout the night, as it came to the port and as it was loaded on the ship.
"We have to have an inventory of what comes into the yard and what goes onto the ship. We do all the scanning through the handheld scanners and then download to D-GATES for accountability. That way, when the ship gets to the other end of the journey, the people doing the offload know exactly what is onboard," Pangelinan said.
The ship will make a stop in Okinawa, Japan, to pick up additional cargo and equipment for the Cobra Gold 2015 exercise on its way to Thailand. The 835th Transportation Battalion, stationed in Okinawa, will work the upload of cargo in Okinawa as well as send a DDMT to Thailand to offload for exercise deployment.
Cobra Gold 2015 will focus on humanitarian assistance and disaster relief. In addition to about 15,000 troops from Thailand and the U.S., this iteration of the annual exercise will include Singapore, South Korea, Indonesia, Japan and Malaysia.