Guam’s Andersen Air Force Base Continues Expansion; Joint Military Opens Professional Maintenance Facility for Combat Vehicles

Written by GBN STAFF

Sunday, October 30, 2011

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Naval Facilities Engineering Command, Marianas and Andersen AFB held an opening ceremony on Oct. 26 for the $12.96 million project, a combat support vehicle maintenance center awarded in July 2010 to Guam Pacific International under a $500 million Small Business multiple award construction contract.

"This joint-use building is intended to support the mission of the 554th RED HORSE Squadron, which operates and maintains more than 400 pieces of heavy civil and building construction vehicles," NAVFAC said. The 554th RED HORSE, or Rapid Engineer Deployable Heavy Operations Repair Squadron Engineers, relocated to Guam from Korea in 2007.

"The facility you see here is a cog in the wheel of the Pacific Air Forces Regional Training Center and supports vehicle maintenance for the 554th RED HORSE Squadron, Commando Warrior, CombatCom, and Silver Flag when they get here," said Col. Scott Hartford, chief of Capital Investment Management Division, Air Force Center for Engineering and Environment.

Col. Hartford explained that up until now, vehicle maintenance for all these groups has been conducted in tents and a makeshift trailer park city.

NAVFAC Marianas executive officer, Capt. Cheryl Hansen, commended the joint Navy-Air Force team overseeing the construction, saying: "It is indeed a tremendous achievement to execute 163,000 hours of work without incident."

The new facility meets silver certification by the U.S. Green Building Council for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design. "This is an example of our continued investments in sustainability," Capt. Hansen said. "We've included technologies that reduce water use by 40 percent, and conserve electricity by 20 percent."

Guam Pacific International, a joint venture between Indiana-based general contractor Custom Mechanical Systems Corporation and Ohio's TolTest Inc., leads awards among the six prime contractors on the military buildup's $500 million Small Business MACC with $29.63 million in task orders so far, all for work at Guam's Andersen Air Force Base, according to a tally by GuamBuildupNews.com.

Last April, GPI won the $9.12 million task order to build water and wastewater utility services to the North Ramp Area of Andersen Air Force Base. In June, the joint venture won a task order worth $7.55 million to build a combat communications operations facility at Andersen.

The Small Business MACC is the third-largest of the buildup contracts, after the $4 billion Guam Design Build MACC and the $3 billion Mamizu MACC, which has yet to be awarded. The buildup construction program, meant in part to prepare Guam for the transfer of thousands of Marines from Okinawa, has lately seen a slowdown in Congressional funding as Washington grapples with the nation's deficit troubles.

For queries regarding this or other stories, email the editor at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Photo used in this article courtesy U.S. Navy. Photo by JoAnna Delfin.

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