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National Defense: Beaumont/Jacksonville

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Ports of Beaumont and Jacksonville to Serve as Staging Points for Equipment for Ebola Aid 

The ports of Beaumont and Jacksonville are serving as staging points for the shipment of military equipment to be used for humanitarian aid aimed at stopping the spread of Ebola in West Africa.

The Department of Defense is coordinating the move of the equipment in support of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the lead agency in charge of the government’s efforts against Ebola in the region.

Beaumont and JAXPORT are two of 17 U.S. Strategic Seaports on call to move military cargo.

The equipment included hundreds of HMMWVs, dump trucks, forklifts and other support and construction equipment will be used as part of Operation United Assistance, the U.S. government’s efforts to contain the spread of the disease in the West African countries most impacted: Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea. Operation United Assistance is providing support for the World Health Organization and other international partners working in that region.

The wheeled equipment arrived at the ports by rail and truck from military bases across the United States and is being shipped in U.S. Navy sealift vessels to the U.S. Army Africa Join Headquarters in Monrovia, Liberia, which serves as the command center for U.S.-led humanitarian efforts in West Africa. The machinery will be used to build up to 17 specially-designed 100-bed Ebola Treatment Units in Liberia.

Vessel loading was managed in Beaumont by the locally-based 842nd Transportation Battalion and in Jacksonville by the U.S. Army 832nd Transportation Battalion, which is headquartered at JAXPORT’s Blount Island Marine Terminal.

The battalions are subordinate units of the U.S. Transportation Command’s Military Surface Deployment and Distribution Command.


Loading Ebola relief cargo aboard M/V Cape Rise (T-AKR 9678) at the Port of Beaumont. The ro/ro ship is part of the federal Ready Reserve Force maintained by the U.S. Maritime Administration on behalf of the U.S. Military Sealift Command.
Photo/Port of Beaumont

 

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