JOINT BASE CHARLESTON, S.C. –
More than 200 Soldiers from Fort Stewart, Ga. came to the Joint Base Charleston Federal Law Enforcement Training Center for a three day Sealift Emergency Deployment Readiness Exercise, May 9, 2016.
During the exercise, Soldiers convoyed more than 100 Humvees, trailers, bulldozers and other vehicles from Fort Stewart to the FLETC to load them onto a ship.
"The purpose of the exercise was to ensure Soldiers could load and unload equipment in a timely manner if they needed to deploy quickly," said Army Capt. Junias Jackson, a 3rd Infantry Division Sustainment Brigade logistics officer.
According to Army 1st Lt. Matthew Jozwak, a 3rd Inf. Sust. Bde. assistant distribution chief, the exercise tested not only the equipment, but the Soldiers.
"As a Solider you're always on alert," said Jozwak. "We have to be ready at all times. You never know when or where you could be going, or how the best way to get there is. Depending on where you're going the quickest way could be by sea or by air. We need to be prepared for everything."
According to Jozwak, many of the Soldiers involved had never done an exercise like this.
"It's a good experience," said Specialist Alex Gibson, a 226th Composite Supply Company mechanic. "The exercise is teaching us be ready to deploy and be able to operate under stressful conditions. We have to make sure everything gets on the ship safely, if something gets damaged it's a huge loss."
Despite this being the first time doing a SEDRE, the Soldiers successfully transported all of the vehicles to and from Fort Stewart in three days.
"This was our first time doing a SEDRE and I was impressed by how smooth everything went," said Jozwak. "All the different units and branches were able to come together as a team to make the exercise a success. They really did a great job with the layout of the vehicles. The layout would have required little time to unload if we had really deployed and needed to go right into the mission."