Over 140 Pennsylvania National Guard soldiers deploying to Middle East

HARRISBURG, Pa. (WHTM) – More than 140 Pennsylvania National Guard soldiers are deploying to the Middle East.

Soldiers with the Pennsylvania National Guard’s 3622nd Sustainment Maintenance Company participated in a deployment ceremony on Saturday morning in Harrisburg.

“We ship out tomorrow,” said U.S. Army 1st Lieutenant, Luke McCoy. 

Those deploying will serve in the Middle East for one year supporting U.S. Central Command and partner forces with regional security objectives.

“We’re a maintenance company, so we’re going to be doing a lot of maintenance and a lot of electronic work, recovery operations, relations with other, with other allied nations and stuff,” McCoy explained. “So, there’s just a lot of maintenance, a lot of good stuff over there.”

Preparing for a mission like this, isn’t easy — to say the least.

“Between getting all the equipment ready that we’re sending over there and getting everyone medically and admin cleared, it’s been a work horse for us to get ready for this thing and the guys work their butts off and I can’t be more grateful now to be going over with these guys,” he added.

The hardest part about deployment for many soldiers though is getting ready to leave family, friends and loved ones.

“I’ve been in for nine years, so it’s my first one [deployment],” said Ashlee Ebling, U.S. Army Specialist. “I’m really excited to do something great, something to do a little hard with the family, leaving the daughter behind and my husband.”

There is one thing many of these soldiers will be taking advantage of while being so far away from home — technology.

“We can facetime, we can WhatsApp signal through those apps and stuff,” McCoy said. “There’s wi-fi over there so we’ll be able to talk just as like if you’re 20 feet over that way and I was facetiming you, we can do that from across the world. So, we’re lucky in that sense to our technology is going to be very great for us.”

The soldiers will fly from the Harrisburg International Airport Sunday and into Texas before they officially head overseas for their mission.

Last year Pennsylvania National Guard soldiers deployed around the world including nearly 700 to Africa, over 150 to Germany, and nearly 50 to the Middle East. In October hundreds of soldiers returned from deployments to Africa.

Founded in 1747 by Benjamin Franklin, the Pennsylvania National Guard is now one of the largest state National Guards in the United States. Since September 11, 2001, Pennsylvania National Guard Soldiers and Airmen have completed more than 43,000 individual deployments.