National Guard Unit Celebrates Welcome Home

GREENSBORO, NC (02/24/2011)(readMedia)-- Almost 80 Soldiers of the North Carolina Army National Guard's A Company, 30th Special Troops Battalion will celebrate a welcome home ceremony at 3 pm at the Joseph S. Koury Convention Center, located at 3121 High Point Road in Greensboro, N.C. on Feb. 25.

Alpha Co., a military intelligence unit headquartered in Burlington, N.C., was stationed in Bagram, Afghanistan and was responsible for providing military intelligence support to the 86th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, of the Vermont National Guard, in order to conduct full-spectrum operations and also partner with Afghanistan National Security Forces in combined operations.

The unit, returned home last month after a year-long deployment in support of Operation Enduring Freedom.

The company Tactical Unmanned Aircraft System (TUAS) platoon's Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) flew over 324 combat missions that ensured the IBCT maintained surveillance over hundreds of patrols and gave the brigade instant battle damage assessments during combat operations.

Additionally, the signal intelligence platoon effectively disrupted Taliban and insurgent communications, and the human intelligence platoon's reports led to the capture of five high-value targets, the recovery of over 30 weapons caches and the identification and successful retrieval of over 300 Improvised Explosive Devices from the battlefield.

The recent deployment is the unit's second since 2004.

Media interested in covering the event should RSVP by contacting the North Carolina National Guard Public Affairs Office at pao@ng.army.mil or by phone at (919) 664-6242. For more NCNG news, please visit our website at www.nc.ngb.army.mil.