624th Engineers in Afghanistan - Commander's Update

Guest Blogger Captain Chris Vernon, commander of the 624th Engineer Company, deployed to Afghanistan.


Captain Chris Vernon, right, briefs civilian employers at Fort Bliss,
Texas, in June 2012  as the unit prepared to deploy to Afghanistan.
(U.S. Army photo by Lt. Col. Hank McIntire)

Overall things are going very well. Currently, other than company HQ, everyone else is out on missions.

First Platoon. About two thirds of the platoon is building a new headquarters building for our Brigade. They have been on that project for about one month and still have a few weeks to go. It is a building similar those we have built for New Horizons in South America, only this building is much larger than the ones I have previously been a part of.

The walls are all up and cement poured in them. We even adapted the building to make high ceilings in the operations center section of the building. We have also had to make our own trusses to accommodate the design change. The rest of First Platoon is assisting in a FOB expansion. Their time there is pretty much done and they are supposed to be leaving the area very soon.

Second Platoon. We have had one of their squads helping us on one of our projects because we've been very busy and they have not. It was really nice to be working with them again, and they were of great assistance to us. Overall, they have been doing a great job training the Afghan engineers assigned to them.

Second Platoon (Arizona Guard). This is the horizontal platoon that has been assigned to work with us. They are a great group of Soldiers with a good work ethic and effective at what they do. They fit in really well with us. About two thirds of the platoon is in the early stages of a FOB deconstruct mission. The rest of the platoon is working on checkpoint improvements.

Third Platoon. Most of the platoon is currently working on a project building B-Huts plus some extras for the FOB they are working at. They will probably be on this mission for another few weeks. The platoon is running well and remaining a strong force.

It looks like there are enough projects in the pipeline to keep us busy with good engineer missions for the next several months, if not for the rest of deployment.

Hope all is going well back home and we appreciate all the support we have been receiving.