Reporter's Notebook: Engineers have seen plenty of Afghanistan

Sgt. Jose Dalmasi, 31, of Carolina, Puerto Rico, slaps a home run during an afternoon baseball game played by Company B, 62nd Engineers, during a lull in the construction of a combat outpost in Maiwand District, Afghanistan. The other two soldiers are Staff Sgt. Jacinto Aguero, 26, of Dallas, Texas, (pitching) and Sgt. Thomas Deaton, 28, of Martins Ferry, Ohio (catching).


Reporter's Notebook: Engineers have seen plenty of Afghanistan
By Drew Brown, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Friday, January 3, 2009

MAIWAND DISTRICT, Afghanistan — The 162 soldiers of Company B, 62nd Engineers, from Fort Sill, Okla., have seen a whole lot of Afghanistan in the past year.

During the last 12 months, they’ve built two forward operating bases and five combat outposts in locations stretching from the rugged mountains in the east to the flat deserts in the south.

Staff Sgt. Jacinto Aguero figures they’ve erected anywhere from 100 to 200 miles of Hesco barriers, the wire mesh and burlap contraptions filled with sand and dirt to create the perimeter walls of nearly every U.S. base in the country.

"We’ve been all over," says Aguero, 26, of Dallas.

The company spent much of the past four months building a new U.S. base out in Maiwand District meant to interdict important Taliban transit routes between Kandahar province and neighboring Helmand.


Rest of article at: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=59756