The Signature
2
Direct Line Cmdr. Jason Christensen, Public Works Officer
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ast November, a few months after PCSing to Sigonella, I received a phone call from my duty officer on a Saturday morning. He explained to me that despite having over one million gallons of storage, our NAS II water levels were dropping quickly and no one was completely sure why. The two Public Works Department (PWD) Sigonella water treatment plants process and treat 530 thousand gallons of water per day on average, and, despite this incredible capacity, we couldn’t keep up. Ultimately, we concluded that the only possible explanation was a severe water leak somewhere on the installation. Our team had actually just completed a series of repairs to three very large water leaks along the main road at NAS II, and those three leaks, even when measured together, didn’t have the nearly the impact that this leak was having on our system. A combined team of Seabees and Italian plant workers quickly put together plans to ration water throughout the base and set off on what I thought was a fool’s quest to find this leak. The team worked throughout the day tracing water lines, shutting off valves, and checking for new puddles throughout the grounds. All the while, our water storage continued to drop. That afternoon, UT2 Young, NAS II Treatment Plant Work Center Supervisor, followed a hunch. He had suspected that this enormous leak was emptying into one of the canals, therefore eluding detection. Sure enough, he found a huge flow of water entering the main east-west canal right behind the NAS II wastewater treatment plant. The team quickly verified what valves could isolate this line and shut them to secure the leak. Within one hour, the NAS II storage tanks were filling back up again – disaster averted! This was my introduction to the
drive, determination and capability of the PWD Sigonella team. We take for granted what we’re used to having on hand: safe drinking water, electricity, heat in the winter, air conditioning in the summer, and even the fact that somehow our wastewater is treated and our trash is collected on a regular basis. The outstanding team at PWD team works extremely hard to deliver these services to the Sailors, Soldiers, Marines, Airmen, civilians, and all community members of Naval Air Station Sigonella—day or night, rain or shine, workday or weekend. Our Seabees and Italians work around the clock to maintain a network of offsite wells, raw water storage tanks, water treatment plants, treated water storage tanks, sewage lift stations, wastewater treatment plants, switch stations, substations, and high voltage lines worth millions in order to treat over 250 thousand gallons of wastewater, produce 530 gallons of safe potable water, distribute 92 megawatt hours of electricity per day, and collect over 30 tons of trash each week in an effort to support the multitude of diverse missions here on NASSIG. Ultimately, our goal at PWD Sigonella is to support you. As such, we’ve worked very hard to increase our level of service, our responsiveness and speed of delivery. We are responsible for grounds maintenance, pest control, janitorial services, refuse collection, environmental oversight, and other services supporting each individual on the installation. Our Seabees and Italian shop force put in thousands of man hours each year repairing and maintaining generators, boilers, mechanical systems, leaky pipes, light fixtures and minor electrical problems. Our high voltage team has been working hand in hand with a contractor to inspect every cable, substation, transformer and breaker on the NAS
II high voltage distribution system to increase the reliability of our power. After a major storm last September we created a roofing tiger team and sent Seabees on roofs to immediately reduce or stop the leaking with short term patches to buy us the time to enable a long-term solution. Now, eight months later, we are about to award over a million dollars in contracts that will repair 17 different roofs throughout the installation. This year we plan on executing nearly $8 million in repairs to critical infrastructure on this base and we are currently administering over $100 million in new construction to support some of our most critical missions here in Sigonella. We take your missions seriously and aim to give you the support you deserve. While we are far from perfect in the execution of our responsibilities, we are absolutely serious about serving each Sailor, each family, and each command on this installation. Our team operates outside of the spotlight; this is how it should be. However, given that we have just wrapped up National Public Works Week (May 16 – 22), please take a second or two and thank one of my hard working Italians, Seabees and civil servants for their efforts.
