European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - July 31, 1968, Darmstadt, Hesse                              Storage rooms Are like ice caves As temperatures fall toward Zero Mark. Is Damon i 1 e very thought of letting spoiled Hank and vegetables get into Thema t t commissary patrons gives Man. To \ga8liardone old chills thetos Boss of Kaiserslautern cold ear the a Misti refrigeration comple base autobahn exit to Ramstein air Complex served by Spur Are stored the by Ray Wrights a Ramstein Bureau chief packaged Frozen foods meat ice Cream and fresh edibles that Are distributed to commissaries in Italy Germany Berlin Belgium and the Netherlands. The unit is part of the come Supply and maintenance Agency. While we have a virtual monopoly on the distribution of chilled subsistence in Usa eur i look at col stores As though it were in Competition with others for commissary business said Gagliardone. If we Don t produce or satisfy our customers we lose the account. With this in mind we continually exert every ounce of our Energy and knowl Edge toward customer satisfaction i both Quality and Quantity. This is our responsibility and our obligation. We want mrs. Housewife to walk into any commissary and be just As satisfied with the perishable items on display there As she would be Back in the . Where she d have any number of supermarkets to choose  one of the Means Gagliardone has instituted to accomplish improvement is a weekly information bulletin to commissaries to help them Sharpen up their handling of fresh foods. It does make sense for us to Knock ourselves out at cold stores to take the utmost care of produce Only to have it deteriorate before the housewife has a Hance to buy it the commander  Don t have the final answer on everything of course so we have invited commissary people to Send in their ideas and suggestions. Well pass thereon to other commissaries and in this Way we think we can vastly improve our Over All  bulletins spell out proper storage handling trimming and display of fresh vegetables layout of work area for preparing vegetables and fruit before Transfer to display bins proper tools to use temperatures and Check lists for storing Frozen foods. The use of sea vans in the Pas year has greatly improved transportation of sensitive items such As lettuce celery cheese biscuits and baking potatoes Gagliardone  sea Van is a refrigerated Box 35 to 40 feet Long with a capacity of 20tons. It is loaded placed on a Chassis which is pulled by truck to the  it is hoisted aboard a specially designed ship which carries Only containers. Temperature of the vans aboard the vessel is controlled by a electrical system capable of holding a temperature to one degree of Varia Tion. Upon arrival at Rotterdam the con Tainer is offloaded placed on another Chassis and brought to cold  movement Inland temperature is controlled by Gas bottles on the  than 60 such vans reach Here every  in cold stores is checked daily by the 64th medical veterinary  from 30,000 to 35,000 pounds of food Are inspected every  make sure the first in first out principle is applied incoming ship ments Are marked with Date codes. Rapid turnover makes it impossible to keep quantities on hand Long enough for them to become  in that tremendous storage build ing yellow forklift trucks move wit the rhythm of an Ultra modern Ballet sequence As they swoop around the food stacks pick up pallets of packages then Dart out to the Long loading ram to Snake the goods into a truck or rail  83rd transportation co of the 53rd transportation in provides truck support and As Many As 75 truck vans can be loaded at one  rail cars can be spotted at the 625-foot loading ramp with Roo for 30 More sidelined in the storage Yard. A Well polished diesel engine owned by Uncle Sam shunts the Ger Man owned rail cars into position on the Spur  mechanics of keeping cold stores cold Are handled by a competent Crew headed by Arnold Seutter. We have a mile and a half of pipe lines in the storage building itself he said. Then we have another 600 feet of piping incur machine House to carry the chill ing ammonia created Gas. Temperature sin the various segments of the Mam building vary from deep freeze to merely cold depending on the Type of food  Welcome the padded Parka offered visitors and soon realize Why the men who work inside cold stores need visits to the warm up room every couple of hours. 1968 the stars and strikes Page ii