The Free Press, Mankato, MN

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January 7, 2010

Mankato-based Reserve unit readies for Iraq

Their job will be to build and train

By Tim Krohn

MANKATO — For the past two years Capt. Brad Hanson has been watching his local Army Reservists training in anticipation of heading overseas.

That training will be put to use as the Mankato-based 492nd Engineering Company deploys to Iraq to build structures for the Army and work with local citizens.

“We have a lot of new people in the unit, fresh out of high school, so this will be their first deployment,” Hanson said.

“The whole unit is excited to get out and put their skills to work. They’re ready.”

While not allowed to give specific numbers, Hanson said fewer than 200 reservists are being deployed to an undisclosed part of Iraq. They will ship out in two weeks.

About half of those going were deployed to Afghanistan for 16 months in 2004.

Hanson, owner of a Mankato general contracting business, is among those seeing his first deployment.

“I’m closing out my tax files for the year, making sure the proper people are in place when I’m gone,” he said. “I want to keep as many people working as I can.”

His wife, Ximena, and daughter, Heather, will handle the office while his foremen, brothers Michael and Philip Schwanz, will run the business for what is expected to be a one-year deployment for Hanson.

For Sgt. Daniel Toleno, this will be his third tour. He did active duty airborne duty in Haiti in 1994 and reservist deployment in Afghanistan in ’04.

This tour should be less dangerous than the unit’s Afghanistan deployment, at least on most days.

“In Afghanistan we were on a combat mission, the detection and removal of IEDs, removing land mines, blowing up old Russian munition caches,” said Toleno of Brooklyn Park. “If it went ‘boom,’ we took care of it.”

When the unit wasn’t clearing explosives, it did construction work in the Ghazni Province, building infrastructure and buildings for Afghans.

The role in Iraq will be vertical construction. “Basically, we’ll build anything the Army needs, and we’ll help the local civilian population in training in construction techniques,” Hanson said.

The 492nd has done construction projects in Minnesota towns, including covering a 142-foot-long rail bridge in Holdingford.

Most of the unit’s members live within a 100-mile radius of Mankato, but some reservists from other states also are being deployed with the 492nd to fill specific needs.

The next weeks will be a mix of soldiers making personal preparations and getting gear ready to take to Iraq. They will use the heavy equipment of the unit they are replacing in Iraq but will still bring the equivalent of about six semi-trucks full of gear.

“We’re taking a lot of equipment,” Hanson said.

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