FT. SHAFTER — Fourteen Hawai‘i residents recently graduated as level one unexploded ordnance technicians from the first-ever certified ordnance safety program class sponsored by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Honolulu District held at Hawai‘i Community College in Hilo. The
FT. SHAFTER — Fourteen Hawai‘i residents recently graduated as level one unexploded ordnance technicians from the first-ever certified ordnance safety program class sponsored by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Honolulu District held at Hawai‘i Community College in Hilo.
The course was presented in cooperation with the Department of Defense, American Technology and the University of Tennessee, said project manager Charles F. Streck Jr. in an ACE press release.
All participants receive academic credit for the class through the University of Tennessee.
“We had great cooperative partnering from the Hawai‘i Community College/University of Hawai‘i system, Parker Ranch and Strategic Solutions, a nonprofit Native Hawaiian advocacy group,” Streck said.
The training is paid for and sponsored through the Formerly Used Defense Sites program, administered by ACE and the Secretary of the Army’s office. The training was a means to increase public awareness and sensitivity to the potential health and safety risks from unexploded ordnance on the Big Island, and the Waikoloa-Waimea area, specifically, the release said.
After completing the six-week program, students are certified as level one unexploded ordnance technicians.
Before, such certification training was only available at Texas A&M University in College Station and UT in Knoxville, Tenn. Because of the cost and time investment required, few local residents who expressed an interest in the UXO course had been able to attend.
“Local training provided Hawai‘i residents an alternative from the associated travel costs and family separation and a somewhat expensive $15,000, six-week training at (other schools),” Clayton Sugimoto from Wil-Chee Associates, the primary contractor for organizing the training, said in the release. “We were able to work with our local partners and ATI-UT in order to hold the training entirely on the Big Island, so lessening effects of absence on those participants with families and other urgent demands.”
The first class of UXO technicians is representative of a diverse local community including members of a variety of local ethnic communities including a large number of Native Hawaiians, the release states. Ages spanned from 19 to more than 60 years. ACE said graduates included a former fire chief from Waikoloa, a representative from the Hawai‘i County Police and Fire Department, homemakers, representatives from Native Hawaiian organizations, a small business owner and an airport security officer.
