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This year Schieber and other Airmen from the Minnesota Air National Guard’s 148th and 133rd Civil Support Squadrons traveled overseas to participate in a Humanitarian Civic Assistance project. They are joined by the Minnesota Army National Guard’s 851st Vertical Engineer Company, along with crews from the Croatian Army Engineering Horizontal Construction Company, to repair and rebuild parts of a primary school in Karlovac, Croatia.
“Deployments for Training are good for brushing up on communication skills and how the units work together and work differently,” said Schieber. “Sometimes I think one unit might be stronger in a different skillset, but bringing units together you might be able to work together from that.”
This year is the 20th Anniversary of the Minnesota National Guard’s- State Partnership with Croatia. The Airmen and Soldiers have been working long hours to remodel and upgrade the kitchen, bathroom and office of an elementary school that services nearly 800 kids in the city. This isn’t the first time Schieber has been exposed to a project in the National Guard with such a high demand.
“I was in Ogulin, Croatia, in 2014 and it was strictly Airmen from the Minnesota Air Guard - we were remodeling a schoolhouse – we got extended a week,” said Schieber, “We did a two-month project in one month. We worked long and late hours. We pulled people from different trades and did a lot of cross training - we got the job done!”
Getting the job done quickly and correctly is a priority with all engineers on the jobsite, regardless of whether they are American or Croatian.
“Language barriers is an obvious one. Learning to become flexible and adaptable to techniques that you may have never seen before,” said Schieber. “You might not know it or even like it, but you have to respect that country’s way of doing things.”
| Date Taken: | 06.17.2016 |
| Date Posted: | 06.27.2016 13:19 |
| Story ID: | 201928 |
| Location: | KARLOVAC, HR |
| Hometown: | ANOKA, MN, US |
| Hometown: | BLAINE, MN, US |
| Hometown: | NORTH BRANCH, MN, US |
| Web Views: | 36 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, 2016 HCA Airman Story - MSgt Kevin Schieber, by MSgt Lynette Hoke, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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