Posted on October 13, 2021
FORT JACKSON, S.C. – The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Charleston District started work in June on the Basic Training Complex Four, Phase Two. When complete, it will make training for new Soldiers at Fort Jackson more efficient.
Located just outside of Columbia, the installation trains roughly 50 percent of all Soldiers entering the Army each year.
“Right now, we are putting up a structural steel frame for a company-sized barracks and getting ready to lay concrete for another,” said Eric Jones, Project Engineer and Contracting Officer’s Representative. “Each one will house about 240 Soldiers in addition to having classrooms, laundry facilities, and offices for the drill sergeants and company command team.”
Formally known as a Basic Combat Trainee Complex, it has all the required facilities to house and fully train the Army’s new recruits, while also being close to field training areas and ranges.
“Soldiers are currently in temporary facilities which are really hard to maintain, they aren’t as functional and they are spread out across the base,” said Jones. “This will consolidate the whole company together. It will bring them better training facilities, better classrooms, newer technologies, all of which will allow them to train more efficiently.”
Jones said he has already heard from drill sergeants about how the new complex will help.
“They tell me ‘I don’t have time to march a company half a mile to be somewhere,’” said Jones. ‘“If I can walk them 100 feet, then I can get more done. I can spend more time with my Soldiers to make them better.”’
The project has a current cost of about $42 million and is expected to be finished at the end of 2022.
In 2008, Charleston District reassumed responsibility for military construction projects at Fort Jackson. Since then, the district has executed over $1.3 billion in projects including new builds, operations and maintenance, and facility investments services.
