Air Force Officer Helps Build Clean Drinking Water Infrastructure for Iraqis

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  • By Maria Callier (Quantech)
  • AFOSR Public Affairs
ARLINGTON, Va --  The challenge for those assigned water system reconstruction work in Iraq's desert environment is not lack of water.

Both the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers run through the heart of Iraq. Rather, the challenge is water treatment. Someone with civil engineering experience is invaluable in helping fix this sort of problem. The Air Force Office of Scientific Research's senior reservist, Lt. Col. Joseph J. Fraundorfer, has such expertise so water treatment became the focus of his recent deployment. As deputy chief of Water Sector for the Gulf Region Division in Iraq, he worked alongside Air Force, civilian and Iraqi civil engineers in a construction crew whose effort has led to positive changes in the lives of the Iraqis.

"Most of our work in reconstruction took us into Baghdad to work with the various Iraqi government ministries and to job sites throughout the city," said the Altoona, Pennsylvania native.

In addition to potable water projects, Fraundorfer and his team worked on improving dams and irrigation capabilities to boost the country's agricultural output as well.

The State Department identified and prioritized projects which involved managing a budget of around $2 billion to construct 400 water projects. Fraundorfer's group worked with Joint Contracting Command to get the jobs under contract, and manage them programmatically to completion.

Fraundorfer's civilian job as program manager (with a large defense and aerospace systems supplier) and his experience with the Air Force doing civil engineering in foreign countries was helpful to his tasks of balancing cost, schedule and technical issues, but he found that doing construction in an active combat environment is a great deal more challenging.

"In spite of the dangers, it was inspiring to see over 3,000 reconstruction projects completed and more still ongoing," he said.

Day-to-day life in Iraq, for Fraundorfer and the team he worked with, was all about starting and managing water projects.

"We worked every day, including Saturdays and Sundays. People joked that it was like being in the movie "Groundhog Day" because every day was the same. We frequently forgot what day of the week it was because it didn't matter," he said.

In the course of doing water projects, Fraundorfer and his team had to travel through Sadr City which has a population of around 3 million people. Built in the 1960s as a good social project to give public housing to about 200,000 people, it is today a place where 50 people per small house, sleep in shifts and on rooftops.

"The IZ (international zone) is in central Baghdad and our water treatment plant is on the far northeast side of the city so getting there meant traveling almost the entire length through Sadr City which took about an hour. We'd spend an hour at the plant and then we'd have to go back through Sadr City to get to the IZ. That was the worst part because everyone in town was expecting us to come back through and that made travel dangerous for us," he said.

Fraundorfer didn't have any real close calls. There were mortars, rockets and bullets that fell around him and some came close to his compound, but none caused any injuries.

By the end of his deployment, Fraundorfer and his team had helped bring clean running water to more than 5 million Iraqis who previously drank untreated or boiled water.

"Groups such as the World Health Organization which track infant mortality and diseases should see a dramatic improvement in Iraq as more of the population has access to clean water," he said.

Upon return home Fraundorfer has periodically sought medical care for a non-combat related shoulder injury he sustained in Iraq. But neither dangerous travel nor personal injury has dampened his patriotism.

"I would return to Iraq. The mission is important and the team of American military, civilian and Iraqi engineers is great. Progress is being made there, and I am very optimistic for Iraq's future. Most Iraqis just want peace and a good future. I think the U.S. can provide a better future for the people and their country than they can provide for themselves alone, so it's important that we win this war.

This is not the 23-year Air Force veteran's first challenging overseas assignment. He served with the military as a test engineer for a space shuttle group, as a civil engineer during the Bosnian War and, in Kosovo, as an air operations and logistics officer. He also did counter-drug work in Panama, civil engineering in Aviano, Italy, and was an air operations and logistics officer in Stuttgart, Germany, during the war in Bosnia. In May 2006, he deployed to Iraq for a four -month tour of duty, but he became so enthused about the mission that he volunteered for a second, four-month tour.