Photo By Willliam D. Ritter | Blue Grass Army Depot employees worked as a team during the depot's recent...... read more read more
RICHMOND, Ky., June 6, 2025 — Forklifts weaved in and out seamlessly, moving in unison, as Blue Grass Army Depot (BGAD) employees worked as a team during the depot's recent Transportation Engineering Agency (TEA) Ammunition Deployment Study, part of the Joint Munition Command (JMC) Outload Exercise at BGAD.
The event at BGAD was a large-scale combat operations (LSCO) exercise, a military training event simulating munition distribution leading up to or during an all-out war. These exercises are crucial for preparing the U.S. Army for modern conflicts involving large, technologically advanced forces. The purpose of this exercise was to evaluate if BGAD support the complexities of a modern, high-intensity conflict.
"We're working on a LSCO exercise," said Gene Walker, BGAD's Munitions Division Chief. "This exercise is to prove and validate that we can follow our plan, and the team's just been amazing."
Brian Freeman, Chief of Mission Management at BGAD, agrees. "They [BGAD's employees] knocked it out of the park. They were very efficient, with good attitudes and very high morale. We planned the exercise over four days, but it ended after day three due to our workers' exceptional efforts," he added.
BGAD conducts these types of exercises every three or four years. The exercise assessed the depot's ability to surge from normal, non-war requirements to a higher-demand, 24/7 mission operation, which is required to support America's Joint Warfighters engaged in a LSCO anywhere in the world.
During the event, the Transportation Engineering Agency (TEA), a United States Transportation Command component, looked for ways to improve BGAD's transportation engineering, guidance, research, and analytical expertise. It searched for findings to help improve the U.S. Armed Forces' global deployability.
The depot prepared for large-scale combat operations by training extra employees in the skills needed to leave their regular jobs at the depot and assist BGAD's daily shipping/receiving employees who work at BGAD's Consolidated Shipping Center (CSC).
"We had prepared for it [the exercise] by having additional BGAD employees complete the AMMO-12 Ammunition Storage Course," said Freeman. "They learned how to store ammunition and use a forklift to put ammunition pallets in the containers."
The AMMO-12 course provides the training requirements for certifying Ammunition and Explosives (AE) Operations Personnel. It offers technical training in correctly applying regulations governing AE's storage, inventory, and physical security.
"BGAD trained approximately 50 depot maintenance employees through the Ammunition Storage Course, knowing that at some point in a large-scale combat operation scenario, they would have to leave their maintenance operations jobs temporarily to support a major outload at our CSC."
The additional employees helped the depot exceed the expectations of the exercise.
"Great effort and I'm proud of everyone," said John Warns, BGAD's Program Manager for Commodity Storage-Movement. "They [BGAD employees] not only met but exceeded the goal. The exercise is important to the entire Organic Industrial Base (OIB) because it proves BGAD's capability. Once again, we've proved that the Blue Grass Army Depot is the premiere shipping center within JMC, partly because we are the only organization with its block and bracing department located on the CSC, which creates greater efficiency," he added.
Throughout the exercise, BGAD employees not only operated at a higher production level than expected, but they also did so at cost savings to the government.
According to Walker, Ricky Krossber, Blocker and Bracer Supervisor at BGAD, Jeremiah (AJ) Haupert, Freight Rate Specialist at BGAD, and Matthew Montgomery, Material Manager at BGAD, devised methods of packing the shipping containers more efficiently.
"BGAD planners successfully reconfigured the load to fit more pallets in each container and reduced the containers used by 20% to 177. This reduction will save transportation costs and space on the vessel," said Col. Samuel Morgan, BGAD Commander.
"Internally to BGAD, these exercises are essential," Warns said. "It [also] helps us improve our training methods and identifies potential weaknesses [for BGAD to improve]. We try concepts we have put together during these exercises to help us prove whether they're good concepts."
Col. Morgan praised his workforce.
"They deliver at the right time and on target every time. They are finding efficiencies, ensuring quality work, and constantly innovating," said Morgan. "Their contributions are essential to BGAD's support of the Joint Warfighter despite challenges facing us, and their efforts are crucial to the U.S. military's mission of lethality and leading with peace through strength," he added.
The Blue Grass Army Depot used trucks and rail cars to ship over 200 shipping containers during the TEA/JMC exercise. According to Gene Walker, during a real-world, large-scale combat operation, the depot could continue to ramp up its production, shipping even more containers per day within the first two weeks of an operation.
Historically, the depot is known for its chemical weapons storage and neutralization. However, that is only a small part of what is on the depot. BGAD makes up nearly 15,000 acres, of which only approximately 10% houses the Blue Grass Chemical Agent-Destruction Pilot Plant (BGCAPP), which neutralized the last chemical weapons in July 2023. The depot has more than 1,220 buildings and more than 900 earth-covered magazines. It has a storage capacity of 3.2 million square feet. It also has more than 170 miles of roadway, 101 miles of fencing, and 41 miles of railroad tracks within its perimeter.
"As the Army modernizes the organic industrial base to generate munition stockpiles necessary to sustain our national defense during wartime, those munitions must be stored with access to transportation infrastructure that can deliver at the speed of war," said Morgan. "I appreciate the TEA/JMC evaluation of BGAD's capabilities, committed workforce, and unique facilities that I view as the Army's premier munitions distribution node," he added.
Established in 1941, BGAD continues to adapt and modernize, implementing 21st-century production capabilities. The depot's primary mission is receipt, storage, inspection, maintenance, issue, and demilitarization of conventional ammunition.
| Date Taken: | 06.06.2025 |
| Date Posted: | 06.10.2025 16:26 |
| Story ID: | 500249 |
| Location: | RICHMOND, KENTUCKY, US |
| Web Views: | 65 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Blue Grass Army Depot Excels at Large-Scale Combat Operations Exercise, by Willliam D. Ritter, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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