Seabees dig deep to help Bosnia
peacekeepers meet their water needs
By Anthony Burgos,
Bosnia bureau
Ivana Avramovic / Stars and Stripes
Petty Officer 2nd class John Kowalski, foreground, and Petty Officer 1st Class William
Crispin disconnect a steel casing used in digging a water well at Forward Operating Base
Morgan. |
CAMP MORGAN, Bosnia and Herzegovina — When the Army needed fresh-water wells in
Bosnia, it called the service branch that knows the most about water: The Navy.
The Navy Seabees, to be more specific.
A group of 15 sailors from the Navy’s Mobile Construction Battalion 40, led by
Chief Petty Officer Douglas Hunt, will soon finish the last of six wells in Bosnia for the
peacekeepers working there.
"It’s a muddy, messy job," Hunt said on Wednesday, as five of his
sailors stood on a wooden platform and connected sections of steel pipe. Mud covered their
hands and forearms and was caked knee-high onto their camouflage pants. And although the
temperature reached the high 80s, drillers still wore their winter boots — turns out
those are more water resistant.
"When they hit water this morning, it just shot up out of the hole. They were
covered in mud," Hunt said.
"The only active drilling teams are in the Navy and the Air Force," Hunt
added.
The sailors have job specialties in the Navy that you’re more likely to see on
construction site in the States than on a warship in the Med. They specialize as steel
workers, equipment operators, mechanics and plumbers.
"But we all go through a two-week training course to become a well-drilling
team," said the group’s most junior member, constructionman Anthony Piscitelli.
The Seabees have already completed wells at Camp McGovern, Camp Connor and three wells
at Camp Commanche. They needed to drill close to 400 feet deep for the well that will
provide the 15,000 gallons of water a day at Camp Morgan. Right now, that water is trucked
to the base.
Ivana Avramovic / S&S
Members of the Navy Mobile Construction Battalion 40 hoist a 20-foot steel pipe that will
be inserted into a water well at Forward Operating Base Morgan. |
Their main piece of equipment is a $500,000 portable well-digging rig. The
125,000-pound machine can go anywhere a truck can carry it.
And with a two-week deadline to finish the wells, the Seabees operated the rig in
five-man teams around the clock.
As the rig chugs through the mud, workers analyze cuttings as they search for the
tell-tale signs that they’ve struck pay dirt — or, in this case, water.
"If the rocks are smooth, or we notice the mud bubbling or water streaking over
the surface, we know we hit water," Hunt said.
Once they reach water, 40 feet of steel casing is placed in the well, followed by 80
feet of screen mesh pipes, then another 280 feet of steel casing, 20-foot section by
20-foot section.
The sections are hand-fastened with a large pipe wrench and lowered into the hole.
"The wrench we are using today is only about 10 pounds because it’s
aluminum," said Petty Officer 3rd Class Glen Goodwin, "but the steel ones are
about 45 pounds. It’s a pretty good workout."
As some workers lowered the final pieces of metal casing, others finished the well.
They dumped gravel into the well’s line, flushed it, put in the final plumbing and
capped it.
Personnel from Brown & Root and the Army will test the water and eventually build a
filtration system for the base.
"But the water is very good," Hunt said. "They are already up and
running at Camp Connor with little treatment."
Once all the wells start pumping water to peacekeepers, it will save the Army about
$150,000 a year.
When the mission ends, Hunt and his men will return to their battalion in Rota, Spain.
"When I joined the Navy, I never thought I’d come to Bosnia," Piscitelli
said. "We got to see Sarajevo. That was pretty cool."
RELATED STORY:
Since the early
days of WWII, Seabees have been building history
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