As the early morning fog drifted across the rippling current of the Missouri River, the North Dakota Army National Guard conducted a wet gap crossing exercise at Kimball Bottoms, Aug. 17. (National Guard story by Sgt. 1st Class Christy Van Drunen)
The 957th Multi-Role Bridge Company led the “Operation Candyland” exercise, with the support of six other units belonging to the 131st Military Police Battalion, 164th Engineer Battalion, 1st Battalion, 188th Air Defense Artillery, and 1st Battalion, 112th Aviation Regiment. The units worked together to secure the area, constructed a temporary floating bridge, and moved personnel and equipment safely across the river.
The exercise focused on providing expedient bridge infrastructure in austere environments during combat or while responding to large-scale emergencies.
The improved ribbon bridge is a floating raft that turns into a road when it is fully assembled. Once in place, vehicles, people and equipment can cross as if it were a permanent structure.
The exercise began before dawn as unit members launched bridge erection boats into the river. Once all the boats were in, crews began dropping bridge sections, or bays, from trucks into the river for the boat teams to push together.
Kimball Bottoms, located south of Bismarck, is historically significant for the 957th MRBC. The last time the unit placed a bridge from bank to bank on the Missouri River, or a “full closure,” was about 15 years ago. There have been some changes in 15 years. A new bridge and bolt system has been fielded and the M30 Bridge Erection Boat has replaced the older MKII BEBs.
However, much of the basic mechanics of the operations are the same. As bridge crewmembers pushed the bays into position, Staff Sgt. Aiden Schuh, a raft commander with the 957th MRBC, took control.
“I’m communicating with everybody on launch and retrieve who is launching the boats and launching the bridge pieces so that we can put the bridge together,” said Schuh, adding that safety and efficiency were key.
“What we do is we build a six-float,” Schuh said. “Which is six pieces — two ramps and four bays — and we land on near shore, load up our security elements, and then raft them across the river or lake to the far shore to drop our first security elements so that we can do bridging operations safely as the security elements are on the far shore.”
By 10:30 a.m., the entire bridge was fully assembled and secured, and Soldiers in Humvees crossed the river.
Exercises like this help build rapport across units that may not typically work together. That means greater integration and interoperability on future missions.