Another important responsibility of the drafting section is that of establishing and maintaining an engineering technical library of current reference publications. The library is used by all personnel of the operations department as well as by anyone else in the battalion who requires technical information. To render service to others, the library must be maintained in an orderly manner.

Normally, the collateral duty of a librarian will be assigned to an EA3 working in the drafting room. He is responsible for arranging the publications, indexing, checking in and checking out publications. He is also tasked with packing the entire library for embarkation during overseas deployment.

Minimum requirements for a technical library are contained in a current COMCBPAC 5070 series instruction. The instruction includes all administrative, military, and technical library requirements that have to be met by each construction battalion. Publications not listed in the COMCBPAC instruction are included in appendix 11 of this training manual. Additional publications may be required depending on the particular mission of the battalion at each deployment.

It is essential that the librarian constantly monitor the technical library and know where each publication is at all times. Loss of important reference publications could cause delays in solving engineering problems. Security of frequently borrowed publications and a good checkout system will help prevent the loss of important publications.

One of the main units of the engineering division is the surveying or field engineering section. This section, like the drafting reproduction section, falls under the direct supervision of an EA1, depending on the number of senior EAs on board and their surveying experience. The size and organization of the entire surveying section will vary with the anticipated work load.

Your job, as an EA3, along with the other crew members in this section, is to carry out the scope of the tasks and responsibilities required of the surveying section. Depending on the overall mission of the battalion, typical surveying tasks may include the following: collecting field data and sketches for design purposes; conducting surveys for horizontal construction (roads, airfields, aboveground and belowground utilities); conducting layout surveys for vertical construction (buildings, retaining walls, waterfront structures, and so forth); developing level nets and level loops to establish vertical control; developing triangulation networks to establish horizontal control; and measuring structures in place for the purpose of preparing as-built drawings.

Versatility of the surveying section is essential to the accomplishment of all the assigned tasks. Sometimes all crews are used on one phase of the surveying task; at other times, crews are shuttled from one phase to another. Basically, for most surveying tasks, personnel are organized into two types of surveying parties: the TRANSIT PARTY and the LEVEL PARTY. They are named after the type of surveying instrument used.