When heavy rains and frozen ground caused floods that resulted in $6.2 billion in damages across the Midwest last year, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) was there, sending personnel and volunteers to do everything from emergency levee repairs to sandbagging river banks and dropping hay from helicopters to livestock cut off by floodwater.
The USACE is made up of 37,000 civilian and military personnel, making it one of the world’s largest public engineering, design and construction management agencies. Its primary mission is managing and overseeing the system of dams, canals, reservoirs and flood control structures across the nation, but it also manages and constructs everything from shipping infrastructure to government office buildings, such as the $1.7-billion Next NGA West headquarters project in St. Louis.