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Fix-it team lets reservists focus on training

JACKSONVILLE, N.C. — The Corps has launched a test program to help Reserve units maximize their training time.

A mobile maintenance team — a test-bed of traveling Marines and civilians from Marine Corps Logistics Base, Albany, Ga. — arrived in Florida on April 7 to begin preventive maintenance on ground equipment that belongs to a Hialeah-based Reserve company.

The team, led by a gunnery sergeant and made up mostly of civilians who work at Maintenance Center Albany, will travel to four different Reserve sites in the Sunshine State to conduct maintenance through May, said Chief Warrant Officer 3 Eric Gilmer, head of the MMT.

“They’re going to do preventive maintenance checks and service on their motor transport and heavy equipment at each site,” he said.

That, in turn, allows Reserve Marines, who operate on a 39-day-a-year training schedule, to focus more on training during that time.

“We’re taking a rock out of the inspector-instructors’ pack, allowing them more time to train,” said Capt. Shawn Daley, logistics maintenance officer at Marine Corps Forces Reserve. “By doing this preventive maintenance, we’re allowing them to focus on what’s important to the commander. This is pure teamwork in action.”

Improving maintenance

The concept of the team was born after Reserve officials called in January for increased maintenance capabilities. MarForRes sought assistance from Albany, which rebuilds and repairs ground combat and combat support equipment.

Mechanics with an average of 15 years experience will do the routine preventive maintenance — inspections, changing oil and filters, repacking bearings and verifying torque on nuts and bolts.

The team will touch everything from Humvees and generator sets to forklifts and various types of heavy equipment at the different Florida test sites.

Those include Human Intelligence Support Team 2, Company C, Intelligence Support Battalion in Hialeah; 4th Air Naval Gunfire Liaison Company in West Palm Beach; Headquarters and Service Company, 4th Assault Amphibian Battalion in Tampa and 6th Motor Transport Battalion in Orlando.

Once the team is finished, it will return to Albany, where officials there and at MarForRes will determine its effectiveness. If this test team is deemed successful, then the formation of other, all-civilian teams will follow from Albany and its sister base in Barstow, Calif.

“This is good for the Marine Corps as far as readiness,” Gilmer said. “We are taking care of our own. In my opinion, it’s much needed out there in the Reserves.”