Investments in Warfighter Sustainment: Arrival of USS Oscar Austin
22 October 2024
Rota,Spain --
Naval Station (NAVSTA) Rota, Spain celebrated the arrival of the guided-missile destroyer, USS Oscar Austin (DDG 79), with a homeport ceremony Oct. 16, 2024 hosted by senior U.S. and Spanish Navy leaders.
The Oscar Austin departed Norfolk, Va., September 30, after being homeported there since its commissioning Aug. 19, 2000, and is now assigned to Destroyer Squadron (DESRON) 60 / Commander, Task Force (CTF) 65 and U.S. 6th Fleet, now the fifth DDG in Rota with a sixth to follow.
Oscar Austin is ballistic missile defense, anti-submarine, and anti-surface warfare capable.
NAVSUP Fleet Logistics Center Sigonella (FLCSI) Site Rota has been preparing for the arrival for years to ensure the crew and their families, approximately 500 people, can be properly supported with mailing and household goods services.
“NAVSUP FLCSI plays a huge role in behind-the-scenes logistics,” said Commander Travis Miller, NAVSUP FLCSI Site Rota director. “We strive and take strategic action to meet the operational needs of the forward-deployed ships, and in parallel, support the needs of the crew and their families.”
FLCSI is responsible for all material processing, shipping, receiving and woodworking since the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) turned over their largest warehouse and its responsibilities to NAVSUP in 2020. While everything, including the storage containers for fuels, was built before the arrival of the first DDG to Site Rota in 2014, FLCSI has been investing to improve the support of all operational forces operating out of this base.
“Moving a ship to a new homeport is a very big deal,” said Andrew Benson, the FLCSI executive director, who attended the ceremony. “The new sailors and their families have property that needs to be shipped overseas. They have letter mail and Amazon packages coming into our post offices. We have to figure out how to store more fuel and more parts for the ships. This is what we do at FLCSI; we sustain the warfighter. This isn’t something that just happens, we’ve been planning for this for a long time to ensure we are ready to support.”
Prior to Oscar Austin’s arrival, the mail center in NAVSTA Rota was at 98 percent capacity for boxes on site. With the arrival of USS Oscar Austin, the estimated growth was 250 new mailboxes. To prepare, NAVSUP FLCSI Site Rota added 360 new mailboxes with plans for a fleet mail center expansion to improve functionally and storage on site.
NAVSUP FLCSI, in conjunction with NAVSUP headquarters, identified a need for more manpower resulting in a proposed increase of 24 additional personnel being added to NAVSUP FLCSI Site Rota to support this growth in mission.
“We've had considerable growth in all products and services supporting all customers across the Iberian Peninsula,” Miller said. “The Oscar Austin is the acute eyes on target that is arriving, but the base footprint itself has grown considerably.”
Over the last two years, NAVSUP FLCSI Site Rota has seen an increase of 500 household goods shipping transactions to support new sailors and their families. This number doesn’t include the other increases in manning around the base as new units move in to support the ships.
The arrival of the Oscar Austin and the other DDGs doesn’t impact just Rota; it makes an impact on FLCSI sites around the region as the ships move through their areas of responsibility.
“As these additional ships operate throughout our critical area of responsibility, we are likely to be supporting them from every site across the FLCSI enterprise,” Benson said. “Our wonderful team of logistics professionals is standing by to support the Oscar Austin and all the other DDGs that now call Rota their home as the move throughout the region.”