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A Killer in the Ranks

Jan 1, 2009 12:00 PM, By Tom Zind, Freelance Writer

Sidebar: Military Contracting Comes With Challenges

The Iraq electrical safety debacle exposes some of the challenges contractors face in having the U.S. military as a client, particularly in a war zone 7,000 miles from the Pentagon. Layers of bureaucracy, command protocol, and contracts can combine to put civilian contractors in the position of bearing a lot of responsibility but not enough authority. That gray area is where KBR, Inc., the Houston-based contractor at the center of the storm over responsibility for some of the problems in Iraq, finds itself. As a defense for allegations it didn't adequately address electrical system deficiencies as part of its facility maintenance obligations, the company is claiming its contract limited its authority to make key calls on fixing specific problems it discovered.

While not knowing exact details of KBR's contract, that's a claim that generally resonates with an engineer employed by a company that assesses electrical safety hazards for military installations. The engineer, who requested anonymity, says it's not uncommon for military contractors to find themselves in a no-win position.

“It looks like KBR is taking a beating from the implication that they weren't doing their job,” he says. “It's all well and good to say a company in KBR's position is responsible, but they don't usually have unlimited funding to go into a 50-year-old Iraq palace, for instance, and bring it up to U.S. electrical standards. Those kinds of things have to be funded and specified.”

While there may be legitimate questions about whether KBR obeyed the spirit, if not the letter of its contract, the engineer says the military may end up shouldering the bulk of the blame for safety problems not being addressed in a timely fashion. The reason, he says, is that military guidelines are fairly clear that the buck stops with commanding officers when it comes to non-combat safety issues on bases.

“When the Army went into Iraq and took over some of these installations — and wanted to put troops in them — there had to be close scrutiny of their safety. That responsibility fell on the commander,” he says.

Realistically, however, the military in Iraq probably lacked the electrical expertise to be able to even reliably flag potential electrical safety problems so they could be fixed.

“The commander is typically advised on issues like this by a base safety manager who should be smart on electrical safety issues,” he says. “But that's extremely lacking. Most don't have a sufficient background in rules and practices for maintaining the safety of electrical systems.”

Sidebar: Duty Calls

For much of 2008, Allan Cohen and Michael Daniels were concerned with how to save their electrical contracting businesses. Today, they're concerned with saving lives and maybe, in the process, their companies.

Cohen, who owns Alco Electrical Contracting, Hawthorne, Fla., and Daniels, owner of Current Demands, Inc., Cartersville, Ga., are two of 70 master electricians hired last fall to help the U.S. military shore up electrical systems in some 90,000 buildings in Iraq. Part of the military's Task Force SAFE inspection teams, the two are using their extensive electrical knowledge to identify unsafe electrical systems that have caused electrocutions, injuries, and fires. For both men, their new jobs are a source of patriotic pride and compensation reportedly upward of $80 an hour that they hope will help keep their companies and families afloat during challenging times. Cohen, 54, watched income from his 10-year-old residential/commercial business dry up last year, and his own finances grow more desperate.

“The economy was bad, and we hadn't gotten much work, so I posted my resume on monster.com in September,” he said last fall. “The same day, I got a reply from Stanley Consultants, the company hiring master electricians for Iraq.”

For Daniels, 38, the call came within minutes of e-mailing Stanley his resume after learning of the openings from his brother. Like Cohen's, Daniels' business was edging toward trouble, and he was looking at Plan B.

“I was having my morning coffee and four minutes after sending the resume I'm on the phone with someone in Iraq asking me if I had a master's license,” he says. “I said I did, she explained the opportunity, I said I was interested, and she asked me what size helmet and flak jacket I wore. I said ‘extra thick.’”

As they awaited deployment to Iraq last October, both said they were excited at the chance to serve in a rewarding new capacity.

“It's an honor for me to assist in this effort, and I feel I can help make a difference,” says Cohen, whose wife, Carmen, planned to continue running the business. “This will also give us a chance to get back on track financially.”

Daniels, who also plans to continue running his business from afar with his wife's help, says the unsafe conditions in Iraq hit a nerve because his brother is a soldier.

“It was eating me alive to see our guys getting hurt and killed on our bases there,” he says. “Bottom line, we've got to make it safer.”

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