Marines with 3rd Maintenance Battalion work late into the evening utilizing a Medium Crawler Tractor Bulldozer to make a purifying water access point for Exercise Balikatan 2014 April 27 in Crow Valley, Philippines. The battalion was the Logistics Combat Element for BK-14 and supported approximately 700 Marines while in Crow Valley. The Marines are with 3rd Maint. Bn., Combat Logistics Regiment 35, 3rd Marine Logistics Group, III Marine Expeditionary Force. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. Joey S. Holeman, Jr./Released)
CROW VALLEY, Philippines – Okinawa-based Marines arrived in the Philippines to set up a base camp in support of Exercise Balikatan 2014 April 27-28 in Crow Valley, Philippines.
The Marines of 3rd Maintenance Battalion, Combat Logistics Regiment 35, 3rd Marine Logistics Group, III Marine Expeditionary Force, arrived in Crow Valley with nothing more than a few vehicles, packs on their backs and a mission: to build, maintain and stabilize a working base camp for BK-14. The battalion’s responsibility as the Logistics Combat Element for the exercise was to entirely support the Ground Combat Element.
“We started with the big berms on the perimeter of the camp,” said Master Sgt. Mark D. McLaughlin, the camp commandant and the contracting staff noncommissioned officer in charge with the battalion. “Then our contracting partners came through with water, coolers, fuel, lights and ice, which are huge assets here.”
As a maintenance battalion, the unit provided third echelon maintenance to III MEF, as well as combat logistics support during the exercise. Their extensive mission does not concern the Marines.
“We do whatever the MEF sends down to us,” said McLaughlin. “There is no mission logistics-wise that we are afraid to take on.”
The Marines attached to the battalion are assigned to various military occupations across the Marine Corps, but together they work side by side to complete the task at hand.
“Heavy equipment is vital to the mission,” said Sgt. Andre T. Diaz, a heavy equipment operator with the battalion. “We play a key role here. The fact that we are lifting 1,000 to 1,500 pounds of equipment is vital to the (mission).”
With Marines specializing in heavy equipment, motor transportation, engineering, utilities and communication, the battalion created chemistry through experience. Logistics is not precision; it is a science that is always evolving, according to McLaughlin.
The Marines worked late nights and early mornings to complete their mission, which sometimes can go unnoticed.
“There is a lot of stuff the other units don’t see and take a lot of things for granted,” said McLaughlin. “They will come on a base camp that is fully evolved and they don’t know how much work really went into doing it.”
3rd Maint. Bn. provided a chow hall, showers, laundry service, Battalion Aid Station, Shock Trauma Platoon, motor pool, air conditioned tents for billeting and perimeter security all in support of the Ground Combat Element for BK-14.
“(It) makes me feel extremely useful,” said Lance Cpl. Ethan W. Goff, a heavy equipment operator with the battalion. “That’s why I joined the Marine Corps; to help the greater cause, support other people, and get whatever mission needs to get done.”
http://www.dvidshub.net/news/132108/3rd-maintenance-sets-up-shop-during-balikatan-2014#.U5ERjcZOWAI
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