7th Engineer Dive Team
Monthly Newsletter Issue 6: July 2011
Published on 27 July 2011
From the Commander’s Desk by CPT Scott Sann Aloha! As summer begins to wane, one aspect of the summer months continues to gather strength: the heat! As we hear news of soaring temperatures throughout the country, we hope that our friends and family continue to stay safe in these blazing temperatures. Here in Kuwait, we’re bracing for the humidity of August, which according to our Kuwaiti counterparts is the hottest period of the year. Luckily, we have plenty of diving opportunities in the coming months which will give us a chance to cool off. August also signals the beginning of the Muslim holiday of Ramadan, which begins on the 1st and ends on the 30th. This monthlong fasting period is observed from sunrise to sunset, during which practitioners forgo food, drink, and other habits of comfort such as smoking. This method of spiritual purification is especially difficult during the humidity and heat of the summer months. We acknowledge this period by not consuming food or drink outside of Camp Patriot; we also try to avoid
scheduling any joint training, as our host nation brethren are usually exhausted and not in the mood for any strenuous activities. As the temperatures rise, so has our operational tempo. Divers are on call throughout theater, from the ports of Oman to the shores of Iraq, the harbor of Kuwait to the dams of Afghanistan. The hard work and training that was conducted in Hawaii is definitely paying dividends. While we are always seeking training opportunities, mission comes first, and we always look forward to being utilized for our unique engineering capability.
their time in financial education, learning a foreign language, or perfecting the skill of lifting three times their body weight. Whatever the challenge we undertake, it’s important to remember that strong teams are composed of strong individuals; I’m inspired everyday by the dedication and discipline shown by each of our team members, each in their own unique way. Hooyah! Deep Sea!
Inside this issue:
XO Notes
2
PSG Notes
2
1st Squad
2
2nd Squad
3
3rd Squad
3
4th Squad
4
Pics of the month
4-5
With all the activity going on around us, sometimes it’s important to shut out the distractions and focus on personal development. Many members of 7th Dive have taken this personal mission to heart in the form of enrolling in multiple college courses, investing
W E’ RE ON F ACEBOOK : “ T HE 7 TH ENGINEER D IVE TEAM”
SGT Hoover teaches an underwater demolitions class to Kuwait EOD Divers in preparation for a joint training exercise
From the First Sergeant's Desk by 1SG Scott Baumgartner Country and Western performer Michael Peterson visited 7th Dive on the 4th of July.
kept it’s cool. Multiple missions have come
Army in bridging operations in the advise,
down the pipeline to support Operations
assist, and training roles. SSG Geffert contin-
throughout the CENTCOM theater that
ued the high standard of support that Army
could have wreaked havoc on such a small
Divers provide to CENTCOM in all of its various
team, but with CPT Sann’s guidance and the
missions.
hard work of the whole team, the 7th has been able to accomplish every mission while
Another highlight this month was
maintaining a high level of excellence in
a combined underwater demolition range with
training not just for ourselves but for Iraqi
the Kuwaiti divers as part of a much larger
Soldiers and Kuwaiti divers as well!
training event known as “Eager Mace.” SGT Hoover excelled at sharing our underwater
Greetings and salutaThe centerpiece mission this
explosive techniques with our Kuwaiti counter-
has been a very busy month for the
month was a dive support mission in Iraq;
parts. He demonstrated maturity and a natural
hard working folks of the 7th Dive!
headed up by SSG Geffert, the team pro-
proclivity for handling the complex task of
I am proud to say that even as the
vided dive support to the bridging unit in
training soldiers who do not share the same
temperatures soar the team has
Iraq who continues to develop the Iraqi
native language. His professionalism and knowl-
tions from the land of sand. July
came across loud and clear to all involved! Spirits remain high as the team looks forward to August which is already shaping up to be busier than July, Good thing for us, that we always enjoy a good challenge!
Mailing Address: (Soldier’s Name) 7th Engineer Dive Team APO, AE 09337
Care Packages Welcome!
Monthly Newsletter
Page 2
Notes from the Executive Officer by 1LT David Guerdan Aloha friends and families of 7th Dive, I hope this finds everyone doing well! This was once again a busy month for 7 th Dive. We conducted joint salvage training with Kuwaiti divers to remove a truck from the port here at the Kuwait Naval Base that proved to be beneficial. This training not only strengthened our relationship with the Host nation, but it also gave us a chance to learn and share salvage techniques. Also this past month, we moved all of our equipment and personnel out of Iraq back down to Kuwait…only to be called right back up there a week later for a mission! Upon hearing this, SSG John Geffert jumped at the opportunity to once again lead his squad in Iraq. They are currently
up there conducting operations with both Iraqi and U.S. Army bridging units and they are without a doubt representing 7th Dive well. As for MWR events, 7th Dive continues to kick butt and take names at anything physical related on this base. Whether it’s SSG Jeb Dunham, SGT John Hoover, and SPC Wesley Wilson dominating the Friday physical fitness challenges or CPT Scott Sann, myself, and SSG Sean Rowley running away from the competition in 5Ks, 10Ks, and triathlons, 7th Dive has unquestionably established physical dominance on KNB. In other exciting news this month, a big shout out is certainly due SSG Sean Rowley’s wife, Angela, who has sent him/us an amazing little machine
known as a Keurig Coffee maker. So thank you Angela!! If you are unfamiliar with Keurigs, you are missing out! It might be 110+ degrees outside but without fail, Soldiers still take breaks when they can to enjoy this high quality coffee. With that, feel free to send us Kcups!
Until next time, take care and enjoy the remaining weeks of summer!
CPT Sann, SSG Rowley, and 1LT Guerdan take a moment to relax after sweeping the podium in the inaugural Blazing Hot Triathlon
Insights from the Platoon Sergeant by SFC Milton Prater We have finally gotten to the half
EOD Divers, Underwater Demo range with the
way point of this deployment. Our replace-
Kuwaiti EOD Divers and still supporting force
ment’s command team will be here at the end
protection missions in Oman. All of that along
of July. They are coming to get a good look at
with planning training for the upcoming second
all that all has happened in the first part of
half of the deployment. So you can see that we
our deployment and to see what they can do to
have been and will be very busy. Hopefully it
prepare before their deployment in the begin-
should make the deployment seem to go by a little
ning of the year. We are looking forward to
faster. The 7th Dive has been representing very
seeing you guys.
well in all sports competitions on KNB. Once again we dominated the KNB Triathlon by taking first,
The month of July has been really
second and third. GREAT JOB!!! I would also like
busy for the 7th with people moving here and
to welcome SFC Woodcox back from his long stay
there. Moving all of our gear back
SFC Prater points out features of the “dog bone”, a floating device used in underwater demolition operations
in Iraq. You have been missed.
to KNB, missions in Iraq, Joint Service missions with the Navy
1st Squad by SPC Patrick Morales Hello everybody out there in the States. Well First Squad did it again, another successful month down and 6 more to go. This month SPC Hall was recommend for SGT, make sure you all tell him congratulations. After that Hall went on leave to enjoy time with his amazing family. Now let’s not forget SPC Morales; he has been busy this month with helping salvage a truck, creating a Demo plan, and studying for the E-5 board. On top of all of this Morales is a MWR junkie. He attends most of the events like poker night and bingo. Morales and the rest of First Squad got the chance to work side by side
with the Kuwait Divers while salvaging an old truck. This gave us a chance to build good relations with the Kuwait divers. We all look forward to future jobs with them through out our deployment. Now our professional athlete squad leader SSG Rowley is training up for the California Iron man, so he thought we should all join him for some unit PT. Run swim run action! It was a great morning if you don’t count waking up at 0430 am. SSG Rowley has been attending his SGT Audie Murphy meetings trying to change the world. After all his hard work the Picture place on base didn’t even give him the right size photo. Lately SSG
Rowley has been planning our next adventure for Deep Blue, which is a supervisor scenario based training event. For the rest of us it’s setting us up for a career in Hollywood. SSG Rowley is putting everything he has into this so it will go off with out a hitch. This should be a great trip for all of 7th Dive. All and all this deployment is going well with many things to look forward
to. So from all of 7th thanks for checking in and have a good day.
SPC Morales happily manning the dive side during joint salvage training with Kuwait EOD Divers
Issue 6: July 2011
Page 3
2nd Squad by SPC Anthony Varas We started the month of July celebrating the success SPC Hall, SPC Russell and SPC Steffic had in their promotion boards; they passed with flying colors. The 7th Dive was more than happy to dive head first into the water for some hands on training. We performed a joint salvage operation with the Kuwait Dive Team, and successfully salvaged a submersed vehicle. Working with the Kuwait Dive Team was beneficial for both parties, as we learned from each other we were able to accomplish our task efficiently. Also this month we have been making several preparations for our upcoming training at the Eager Mace Demo Range, something a lot of us are looking forward to. Demolition is this writer’s favorite part of the job. We wished SFC Woodcox, SSG Geffert, SGT Bays, SPC Russell, SPC Steffic, SPC Bullington, and SPC Martinez luck as they deployed to Iraq to aid in training the Iraqi army. To end this month, we had a very invigorating and challenging Run-Swim-Run headed by SSG Rowley. A three mile run with an 800 meter swim and to top it all off a two mile cool down run. Though this doesn’t sound fun, its an easy day for the 7th Dive.
Army Divers and members of the 1-182nd Field Artillery Regiment start their day right with some run-swim-run physical training
3rd Squad by SPC Kyle Steffic The month of July started fast for Third Squad when Squad Leader SSG Dunham accompanied SPC Steffic to the promotion board on the July 1st. The board was a success and SPC Steffic was relieved to have completed the task. Back at the Detachment the rest of Third Squad was hard at work, preparing for the “Eager Mace Salvage project”; a sunken truck at the bottom of the KNB Harbor. SSG Dunham was NCOIC for this project, and it too was a success. The truck was salvaged, placed onto an LCU, dropped back into the water, and re-salvaged to ensure that everything would run safely when dropping the project into the ocean.
Old trucks are removed from the Kuwait Naval Base’s port for their future use as underwater demolition targets
On top of this task, third squad members were the primary instructors for ser-
geant’s time training for the month of July. SPC Wilson acted as NCOIC for two days of training to include Chemical Biological Radiological and Nuclear training, and side scan sonar training as well. SGT Hoover trained the unit on Hydrographic Survey operations, an area of which he has extensive knowledge which has proven to be very valuable to 7th Dive. In late July, SPC Steffic left Kuwait to accompany 2nd squad to Iraq, to assist with bridging operations. The rest of third squad stayed in Kuwait to conduct joint demolition training with the Kuwaiti divers. Hard work, good diving, all is well with Third Squad.
4th Squad by SPC Joe Moore First off I want to give a warm welcome to SSG Cochran to 4th squad; he will be taking the position of SFC Harrison as the maintenance NCOIC. Good luck in your new position. Next I want to congratulate SGT Nnabue on her recent promotion and re-enlistment. As always 4th Squad is very busy. SSG Rohde just came off leave from Ireland. I really do envy his trip there, but glad his wife took many pictures. Now I just need to learn how to photoshop myself in them and tell everyone I was there. If anyone would like to know more about his leave he has many stories and a lot are amazing. SPC(P) Martinez, I would say, is the busiest of us all. Not only is he on dive side helping and giving his medical support to the divers, but he continues to do his college, maintain his fitness, and on top of it all find time to go on missions. Right now he is supporting the divers on a mission to Iraq. I wish him the best of luck. SGT(P) Vicente has been doing her
supply thing. I really don’t know much about her job, I just know it is important. Right now she has bragging rights. She won the 5k run on 4th of July in the female bracket. She will be dearly missed soon, as she gets ready to go on leave soon. It is a much needed time off for her.
be doing something right because no one is crying themselves to sleep at night…yet!
isn’t much we can’t do. We will con-
What more can I say about this
ues to run. Until next time readers,
amazing squad, except really there
take care. DEEP SEA!!!
tinue to do great things for 7th Dive and make sure that the unit contin-
SGT Nnabue has been ensuring that maintenance and services are done on all the equipment this month. It plays an important part in how the unit functions and is able to complete missions. We are still waiting for her next poem. Wondering what could be next in store for this talented artist; stay tuned to find out. SSG Cochran is the new edition to 4th Squad. He has been working with SGT Nnabue and the rest of the unit to make sure that the other squads are doing the proper maintenance on unit equipment. I do know he has a lot on his plate and will be swimming in paperwork for awhile. As for me, I continue to make sure all the communication equipment is working to keep morale up. I must
SGT (P) Vicente enjoys the fruits of victory after smoking the women’s field in the July 4th 5K
MWR in the Summer!
Hooyah PT!
A peaceful jog to begin the day...
So...what’s next?
Avoid the jellyfish!
A short step and a long drop!