Watervliet Arsenal Newsletter : Salvo 30 April 2013

SALVO
Story begins on page 3
Photo by John B. Snyder
Do you feel safer?
You Should!
Vol. 13, No. 4 U.S. Army Watervliet Arsenal, New York April 30, 2013
Also inside:
Commander’s Column
4-County Exercise
Box Shop goes Lean
Benét Labs Leads DOD Challenge

Salvo April 30, 2013
The Arsenal Salvo is an authorized monthly publication for members of the Department
of Defense. Contents of the Salvo are not necessarily the official views of, or an endorse-
ment by the U.S. Government, the Department of Defense, the Department of the Army, or
the Watervliet Arsenal.
News may be submitted for publication by sending articles to Public Affairs Officer,
1 Buffington Street, Bldg. 10, Watervliet, NY 12189, or stop by office #102, Bldg. 10,
Watervliet Arsenal. The editor may also be reached at (518) 266-5055 or by e-mail:
john.b.snyder.civ@mail.mil. The editor reserves the right to edit all information submitted
for publication.
Commander, Col. Mark F. Migaleddi
Public Affairs Officer, John B. Snyder
Editor, John B. Snyder
Photographer: John B. Snyder
Arsenal Facebook Page @
http://on.fb.me/sq3LEm

Commander’s
Corner
Mark F. Migaleddi
Commanding
Manufacturer 6
For many of us, the arrival of spring means that after
months of a long cold winter we can begin to expand
our activities at home and at work. Given this year’s
fiscal uncertainty, I understand that for some of you
your personal activities are on a holding pattern. In
some regards that remains true with respect to our fu-
ture workload.
For one week this month, I was on daily teleconfer-
ences with higher headquarters regarding how to
maintain our critical manufacturing capabilities dur-
ing the current and future austere environment. It was
an honor briefing our senior Civilian leadership at the
highest levels of both the Army Staff and Office of the
Secretary of Defense.
To be honest, it was difficult to remove emotion from
my voice as I explained why the Watervliet Arsenal
was important to the Department of Defense and why
DOD should fund the arsenal annually to maintain our
critical capabilities. I will tell you that every arsenal
commander believes they have skin in this game and
each one is going “all in” trying to create awareness in
senior levels of government for their mission and for
their employees.
The bottom line is that there is no news in regards to
furloughs. We have seen Congress step in and put
forth legislation that will end the furloughs for other
federal agencies, such as the Department of Transpor-
tation. I can tell you the Army’s senior leadership is
doing everything possible to buy back as many days
as they can to minimize or eliminate administrative
furloughs.
But as dire as the current situation may seem, I am
pleasantly amazed at the professionalism, dedication,
and the sense of urgency our workforce has for ac-
complishing the mission at hand. Maybe “amazed”
isn’t the right word to use because our workforce has
consistently shown such effort for nearly 200 years,
despite the ebbs and flows of workload. Nevertheless,
you are truly the shining light through this period of
uncertainty.
No matter what falls out in regards to furloughs, I
need you to continue to give 100 percent to getting the
right product to our servicemen and women when they
need it. If there was ever a time in our history that
we needed to make our operations more efficient and
quality unsurpassed by any other defense manufac-
turer, now is that time.

The Watervliet Arsenal conducted a two-hour antiter-
rorism exercise earlier this month that brought together
more than 75 first responders from Albany, Schenectady,
Rensselaer, and Saratoga Counties. This exercise tested
arsenal and community first responders’ ability to react
to a simulated terrorist threat involving chemical, bio-
logical, and radiological agents.
The exercise coordinator, Arsenal Fire Chief John Whip-
ple, said the arsenal began integrating community first
responders, such hazardous material and EMS teams,
about three years ago into the arsenal’s training plan for
antiterrorism exercises.
“We knew that if there was ever a crisis on the arsenal
that we would immediately make a call out to fellow
first responders at local and state levels for support,”
Whipple said. “These types of multi-echelon exercises
allow us to better understand the unique capabilities that
each response team may bring to a real-world incident.”
Page 3 Salvo April 30, 2013
Story continues on page 4, See Training
Better trained, community better protected
By John B. Snyder
A four-county antiterrorism exercise conducted on the arsenal this month brought together more than 75 first responders who worked with
each other to attack three scenarios that required some degree of decontamination.
The goal of the exercise was to coordinate a quick
response to a simulated terrorist attack that required
decontamination of radiation, an unknown powder sub-
stance, and a sulfur dioxide leak.
Schenectady County Fire Coordinator John Nuzback
said the exercise was planned well before this month’s
bombing in Boston, but that the events from Boston
only solidify just how important it is for community first
responders to train as a team.
“Equipment and well-trained personnel are important to
providing a quick and complete response to a crisis situ-
ation,” Nuzback said. “But it is the teamwork and the
relationships that we build through these exercises that
are most important.”
Prior to the first vehicle arriving, the arsenal had to es-
tablish an incident command post that was manned by
Stephen Bogart, Assistant Fire Chief for the Watervliet
Arsenal. From that command post, Bogart had to quick-

Training cont.
ly assess the large volume of information flowing in
from inside the arsenal fence line, as well as from out-
side the fence line.
Once Bogart developed a firm situational awareness
of the threat and of the capability flowing into the ar-
senal, he was able to assign the right mix of capability
to the immediate requirement. To assist Bogart was
John J. Walsh, the Albany County Emergency Man-
agement Liaison.
“It would have been very difficult, if not impossible,
to handle today’s response unless I had a qualified
liaison to work with me due to the large amounts of
information and coordination that was required for
the exercise,” Bogart said.
Once the last hose was rolled up and the training site
cleared, Whipple reflected on the morning’s exercise.
“This was a great exercise that brought together
more than 75 experienced first responders who came
with millions of dollars of equipment to train as one
team,” Whipple said. “What the casual observer of-
ten misses in these types of exercises is the difficulty
of providing command and control, as well as the in-
tegration and synchronization of various capabilities
in a real-time scenario.”
During the after action review, Whipple thanked the
local and state emergency first responders, to include
those who stood back and took notes. There were al-
most as many observers and controllers as there were
exercise participants. The robust oversight of the ex-
ercise ensured that every lesson learned, positive or
negative, could be captured and then learned from.
“We know that after this morning’s exercise that we
are better prepared to respond to a crisis than we
were yesterday,” Whipple said. “The community
should know that the amount of capability brought to
the arsenal today in regards to command and control,
equipment, and personnel, is what they should ex-
pect to arrive on their street if ever needed.”
This exercise was directed by the Arsenal’s higher
headquarters, TACOM Life Cycle Management
Command.
Photos by John B. Snyder
& Billy Martin
Photos from top to the bot-
tom. A decon team from
the community prepares
to seal a leak on a sulfuric
acid pipe. Arsenal Fire
Chief John Whipple, stand-
ing on the back of a pickup
truck, provides an over-
view of the training exer-
cise to participants prior
to the start of the exercise.
Arsenal firefighters set-
ting up a decon site. This
training had great publicity
in that it was covered by
all major local media as
seen here when Schenect-
ady Fire Coordinator John
Nuzback , right, was being
interviewed.

not have a standard communication program and that
is where the MTConnect protocol comes in.
“Imagine if we could communicate in real time with
every machine, using a common standard, how much
clearer a manufacturing center’s common operational
picture would be,” Snyder said. “Then if we could
take that same application and applied it to other
manufacturing requirements such as the amount of
energy being consumed by machines and by buildings,
manufacturing efficiency would dramatically
improve.”
DOD has two main goals for the
challenge, Snyder said.
“The first goal is to motivate
domestic software and system
experts who would develop
the applications, using the
MTConnect standard, that have
the potential to make defense
manufacturers more efficient and
competitive,” Snyder said. “The
second goal is to then take those
award winning concepts and to
create the tools that could be
adopted by DOD, to include the
Watervliet Arsenal.”
Phase one (Ideation Phase),
which began on April 12, 2013
and closes on May 31, 2013, will
award each of the five winners
$5,000 each. This phase is
essentially a concept development
phase where great, innovative
ideas are measured by their utility and attainability.
In the second phase (Challenge Phase), which begins
on July 1, 2013 and closes on Jan. 17, 2014, Phase
By John B. Snyder
Benét leads DOD challenge to harness private
sector innovation for defense manufacturing
The Army’s Benét Laboratories announced this
month that it is the program manager for a $250,000
Department of Defense challenge that began
earlier this month to harness private sector advance
manufacturing and intelligence innovation in hopes to
make defense manufacturing, such as at the Watervliet
Arsenal, more efficient and competitive.
John P. Snyder, Ph.D., who is a senior mechanical
engineer with the Army’s
Benét Laboratories at the
Watervliet Arsenal and who is
also the program manager for
the DOD challenge, said that
DOD entered the first phase of
what is called the MTConnect
Challenge on April 12.
“The challenge is essentially a
tool for DOD to reach outside
of the defense research and
development fence line to
domestic academia and
industry, via MTConnect
protocol, to stimulate thought
and development of tools and
applications that will enhance
defense manufacturing
capabilities,” Snyder said.
DOD-operated manufacturing
centers have hundreds, if
not thousands, of machines
that for the most part operate
independently, Snyder said.
Each machine has a value to the manufacturing
process but its current status, such as where it is in the
work flow or its maintenance status, is often captured
by stubby-pencil calculations that are not in real time.
The bottom line is that defense manufacturing does
The potential for harvesting innovation from the private
sector may someday allow arsenal’s machinery, such as
seen here, to provide a real-time common operational
picture. Arsenal machinist Tom Ostrander, left, is receiv-
ing training on the new Mori Seiki machine from Harvey
Downs, Boldt Machinery Inc., in March 2013.
Story continues on page 6, See Benét

one winners take their concepts and develop them
into concrete software applications. The grand prize
of $100,000 will be awarded to the Challenge winner
in April 2014. Second place award recipient will re-
ceive $75,000 and the third place finisher will receive
$50,000.
The Defense-wide Manufacturing Science and Tech-
nology center is DOD’s sponsoring organization, and
the National Center for Defense Manufacturing Tech-
nology and the Association for Manufacturing Tech-
nology are partners with Benét Labs to administer the
Albany Devils honors the Arsenal
The Albany Devils Hockey organiza-
tion honored the Arsenal’s 200 years of
continuous service during their Military
Appreciation Game on April 13, 2013.
The Devils read the history about the
arsenal while showing 20 arsenal photos
to more than 4,000 who were in atten-
dance. Arsenal Commander Col. Mark
F. Migaleddi and Albany County Execu-
tive Dan McCoy dropped the ceremo-
nial pucks to start the game.
challenge.
MTConnect® is a newly developed, open communica-
tion standard that provides the capability to pass data
from equipment and devices to higher level systems
for further processing using the XML-based standard.
The MTConnect Challenge focuses on promoting the
development of manufacturing platform solutions us-
ing a standard protocol.
The Association for Manufacturing Technology ad-
opted the MTConnect® standard to standardize com-
munication protocols that manufacturing equipment
can follow to share data.
Benét cont.

line items or product lines shipped every month from
Watervliet. Beyond the paint that Migaleddi and others
applied to visually improve the box shop, there were also
substantial alignment of activities that will greatly improve
the workflow … specifically, the arsenal’s mortar manufac-
turing line.
“In addition to making the work area more atheistically
pleasing, we also made significant improvements to our
mortar work flow by relocating manpower and equipment
from another building into the box shop,” said Steve Koza,
the supervisor of
the arsenal’s Man-
ufacturing Support
Division.
“We can now
machine mortar
products, such as
the barrels for the
60mm, 81mm, and
the 120mm mortar
systems, and then
transport those
products to our
box shop in a mat-
ter of minutes,”
Koza said.
At a time when
the arsenal is
manufacturing
up to 100 60mm
mortar systems a
month for Afghan-
istan, anything the arsenal can do to streamline the process
helps to ensure that tight delivery schedules are met, Koza
explained.
Other benefits of the 6S project are that Koza now has
better oversight of his operations because his workforce
will now work in one area versus separate buildings. Ad-
ditionally, such things as making the work area more ergo-
nomically friendly will improve workers’ safety as well as
morale.
How well did the commander do in regards to painting?
When asked that question, Koza simply smiled, winked
and said the commander did fine.
Everyone knew that when Sequestration hit on March 1
that there would be significant cuts within the Department
of Defense. And so, when arsenal Commander Col. Mark
F. Migaleddi was spotted this month holding a paint roller
in the box shop some thought the budget cuts had gone too
far.
It turned out that Migaleddi wasn’t painting due to fur-
loughs or layoffs. He was in the box shop to lend his hand,
as well as his position to a program called Lean.
The arsenal’s Lean program continuously assesses what
operations are re-
quired to support the
customer, which in
more than 90 per-
cent of the orders is
DOD. Once select
activities are as-
sessed, they are then
measured to see how
effective the arse-
nal is in conduct-
ing those activities.
Once the assessment
is done, the arsenal
then eliminates those
activities, processes,
or functions that do
not add value to the
customer.
For the arsenal,
the tendency might
have been to just
look at the machining side of the house. But Migaleddi
saw that there might be value added by drilling down into
non-machining tasks, such as administrative offices and
the box shop to improve quality and to reduce lead time by
eliminating waste.
Within Lean, there is a program called 6S. The arsenal
is actively using 6S to not only improve housekeeping
practices, but also to improve processes of off-production
line activities. In essence, 6S goes beyond the simple
beautification of an office or work area to actually improv-
ing work flow and communication.
The arsenal’s box shop handles more than 700
Commander found trying to
paint his way out of a box ... shop
By John B. Snyder
Col. Mark F. Migaleddi, left, may have known it was lonely “at the top,” but it appears in this
photo that it is just as lonely in the “trenches.” While Migaleddi worked on the wall by him-
self, Kevin Chase, box operation handler, and Steve Koza, supervisor for the Manufacturing
Support Division, team up to paint the box shop as part of a Lean 6S project.

By Jim Michaels, USA Today
(Provide by the Early Bird, April 29, 2013)
WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon is accelerating the
deployment of mortars and artillery to Afghanistan's
fledgling army in an effort to compensate for the
impending loss of U.S. air power, which has proved
devastating against the Taliban over the years.
The loss of
American fire-
power after 2014
will be a key
challenge for
the Afghan force
and highlights
stark choices the
White House is
confronting as it
shapes a follow-
on force.
Afghan com-
manders are
worried about its
impact on opera-
tions.
"They certainly
haven't missed
the fact that the
finest air force on
the planet is go-
ing home," said
retired Marine
general John Al-
len, former top coalition commander.
The Pentagon has said it will leave advisers and
counterterrorism forces in Afghanistan after the com-
bat mission ends. Air power will be available for the
U.S. counterterrorism forces.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai has been critical of
air attacks, accusing the coalition of mistakenly killing
civilians. The White House has also been pushing to
limit the size of the post-2014 force in Afghanistan,
which restricts the amount of support the U.S. can
supply, military analysts say.
Afghans To Miss U.S. Air Power
Afghanistan's air force is not expected to be fully
operational until at least 2016, the Pentagon said.
Even then, it won't have near the capabilities of the
U.S. military. The Afghans' main close air support
plane, a turboprop Super Tucano, won't be fielded
until mid-2014, Air Force Maj. Gen. H.D. Polumbo, the
top coalition air
commander, said
recently.
Allen said the
coalition is taking
steps that will
give Afghani-
stan's military a
firepower advan-
tage over the
Taliban, includ-
ing providing ad-
ditional mortars
and arming their
Mi-17 helicopters
with rockets and
gatling guns.
The additional
firepower, which
will be integrated
into small units,
will let Afghan
troops respond
quickly and
coordinate with
troops on the
ground, he said.
"Air power has provided a critical asymmetric advan-
tage" in the U.S. and coalition campaign since 2001,
Polumbo said.
Militants are unable to mass forces without risking
a devastating attack, forcing them to fight in small
groups and resort to roadside bombs and strikes on
civilian targets.
The loss of air power will take a key advantage away
from Afghan forces, said Fred Kagan, a military ana-
lyst at the American Enterprise Institute.
This is what an Arsenal shipment looks like once it leaves Watervliet. Here are the Arsenal’s
60mm mortars on a C-17 aircraft being downloaded in Afghanistan. Watervliet Arsenal an-
nounced in February 2013 that it received a $5.9 million contract to provide the Afghan Nation-
al Army with nearly 900 60mm-mortar systems, as part of the U.S. State Department's Foreign
Military Sales program. The Arsenal made its first shipment of the 60mm mortar systems in
February 2013 and has been shipping about 100 systems a month to Afghanistan.
Photo provided by the U.S. Air Force

CPAC -
Civilian Personnel Advisory Center
Want to view your Official Personnel Folder? We’ve gone paperless!
Employees often call or come to the CPAC office asking to view their OPF (Official Personnel Folder) or 201
File, as it used to be called. Previously, CPAC would have to request it from the file storage room in Maryland,
wait a few weeks and then set up an appointment with the employee once it arrived for viewing. Employees
would then have to sit down with a CPAC representative, present and flip through their OPF page by page, tab-
bing off any forms that they wanted copies of. The OPF would then be returned to Maryland for storage.
Not anymore. All employees now have online access to their eOPF or electronic Official Personnel Folder! The
electronic version is exactly the same as your paper OPF, but each document was scanned into the system and
made available to you through the eOPF system. This allows for more privacy in viewing your personnel file,
more thorough viewing, and the ability to check it as often as you’d like. You can view, print or save any or all
of your documents at any time.
Documents can be sorted by effective date, type of document or folder side when scrolling through simply by
clicking the column heading. You can also search for a particular document by date or title.
In addition, you will also be notified by email whenever a document is added to your eOPF. This means real-
time access to your beneficiary forms, Notification of Personnel Actions (SF-50s), benefits elections, etc. This
system saves on postage, paper and time and is a huge benefit to both CPAC representatives and to you, as an
employee.
Appropriated Fund (AF) and Nonappropriated Fund (NAF) employees can gain access to eOPF by following
their respective login links.
The login URL for AF employees is: https://eopf1.nbc.gov/army/
The login URL for NAF employees is: https://eopf1.nbc.gov/armynaf/
Begin by clicking on “Request Your eOPF ID” and enter your personal information. You will then receive an
email containing your eOPF ID. Once you have that information, click on “Request your eOPF Password”. You
will need to enter more information, including your eOPF ID, to obtain your password. If you’d like additional
assistance, you can review the Basic User Videos at: http://cpol.army.mil/library/general/eOPF.
To protect the integrity of employee personnel records and security of Personally Identifiable Information (PII),
access to your eOPF records can ONLY be gained by using a Government computer.
If further assistance is needed logging into eOPF or if you have any questions, you can contact CPAC at
(518) 266-5400, 266-4058 or 266-4053 or by email: usarmy.watervliet.tacom.list.wate-cpac-wva@mail.mil.

of launching a projectile up to 20 miles. In May 1950,
the Watervliet Arsenal was assigned the task of design-
ing and creating a 280mm gun while Watertown Arsenal,
Mass., was responsible for the carriage design. In 1951,
the first two complete 280mm atomic cannon systems,
costing $800,000 each, were ready for months of a series
of extensive test firing using conventional warheads at the
Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland.
Crane was interviewed by the Troy Times Record news-
paper after he returned from witnessing the atomic test of
the 280mm cannon. His comments and observations were
printed in the May 27, 1953 issue of the newspaper.
“The test firing of the atomic shell from a cannon de-
signed and built at the Watervliet
Arsenal was successful in every
aspect,” said Crane after return-
ing from the Las Vegas testing
grounds where he witnessed the
blast destined to revolutionize the
tactics of ground warfare. “With a
prearranged schedule determined
to split-second accuracy, the gun,
designed and manufactured by
technicians at the Watervliet Arse-
nal, placed the projectile
with a remarkable de-
gree of precision. It was
the most awesome thing
I have ever seen. My
first sensation was one
of tremendous relief.
We had confidence in
our calculations and all
our years of study and
design but only the fir-
ing could prove we were
right.”
Crane was aware of
the awesome power and
potential of the atomic
cannon.
“Think how much earlier World War II would have
ended and how many lives saved if the weapon had been
available at the Battle of the Bulge when tactical aircraft
was grounded for several days by weather conditions. We
have created this great weapon and now we have to use it
intelligently.”
Crane commanded the arsenal from September 1952 to
August 1954, after spending years involved in the design
and manufacture of atomic artillery.
Arsenal led the Army into the nuclear age
Photos provided by the Arsenal Museum
Sixty years ago in the spring of 1953, Watervliet Arsenal
played a major role in the advancement of the United States
nuclear weapons program and, in effect, sped up the end
of the Korean War. At 8:31 a.m. (PST) on May 25, 1953
more than 3,000 enlisted men, officers, and VIPs gathered
at Frenchmen’s Flats Nevada Proving Grounds to witness
history. On that day, a 280mm M65 Atomic Cannon, with
the breech and tube assembly manufactured in Watervliet,
test-fired its nuclear payload.
The 44-foot long gun sent a 800-pound, nuclear-armed
round seven miles downrange with 15 kilotons of explosive
force. For comparison, the Hiro-
shima and Nagasaki atomic bombs
were 20 kilotons each (or 20,000
tons of TNT). The projectile
exploded 525 feet above the desire
target zone, instantly destroying
a series of railroad cars, a steel
trestle, and other simulated mili-
tary targets. It took 19.2 seconds
for the projectile to reach its target
zone.
This test firing, one
of several nuclear tests
that occurred in the early
months of 1953, code
named “Shot Grable,”
proved to the world
the United States could
successfully launch a
nuclear payload from an
artillery weapon. The
successful test meant
that the U.S. would be
deploying such weapons
in Europe and Korea and
therefore, putting teeth
into President Eisen-
hower’s verbal and written pledge to ending the Korean
War. Within months, the stalled peace talks began again,
with an armistice signed on July 27, 1953.
The successful test was witnessed by two representa-
tives from Watervliet Arsenal: Ralph Avakian, Ordnance
Department engineer and Col. Richard Z. Crane, Watervliet
Arsenal Commander. The idea for a massive ground based
cannon began in 1944 during World War II. U.S. military
leaders, impressed with German long-range cannons, envi-
sioned having their own long-range, mobile cannon capable
By Mark Koziol
Top: The first nuclear-capable gun being manufactured at the Watervliet Arsenal
in the early 1950s.
Bottom: The “Atomic Annie” firing its first round in 1953.

Last month you learned acronyms,
this month quotes
By Mark Ripley
Lean Manufacturing:
Lean is about change and has a bias toward action. In other words, go ahead and make the change as best you can but
pay attention and fix whatever comes up. But changing can be scary. Okay, you are seasoned federal employees and you
don’t scare easily and so, let’s say that change makes many of us feel uncomfortable.
Why? Because we work so hard to adapt to our current environment. Without failure, once we settle into our comfort
zone someone is around the corner yelling that we must “change.” Now, don’t go feeling sorry for yourself because
adapting to change is not unique to today’s workforce. Take a look at what others have thought about the notion of
“change.”
“Change is hard because people overestimate the value of what they have and underestimate the value of what they may
gain by giving that up.”
James Belasco and Ralph Stayer
“It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.”
Charles Darwin? Note... According to internet sources, this quote is commonly misattributed to Darwin and is widely
claimed by several authors who interpreted Darwin’s theories.
“To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.”
Winston Churchill
“Failure is not fatal, but failure to change might be.”
John Wooden
“Change before you have to.”
Jack Welch
“Your life does not get better by chance, it gets better by change.”
Jim Rohn
“If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading.”
Lao Tzu
“The best thing you can do is the right thing; the next best thing you can do is the wrong thing; the worst thing you can do
is nothing.”
Theodore Roosevelt
“If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten.”
Tony Robbins
“In a chronically leaking boat, energy devoted to changing vessels is more productive than energy devoted to patching
leaks.”
Warren Buffett

Take Your Child
to Work Day
April 2013

Watervliet Arsenal Newsletter : Salvo 30 April 2013

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Watervliet Arsenal Newsletter : Salvo 30 April 2013