After training in New York, the unit will deploy on Dec. 7.

AUGUSTA (AP) – Members of a Maine National Guard unit are being activated for duty, the state’s adjutant general, Maj. Gen. Joseph Tinkham II, announced Wednesday.

The 133rd Engineering Battalion, Maine’s largest guard unit, was notified Monday that it is being deployed. The battalion is based in Gardiner and has companies and platoons in Portland, Belfast, Skowhegan, Westbrook, Lewiston and Norway.

The deployment will begin Dec. 7 and soldiers will be called to active duty initially for no longer than 18 months, Tinkham said. After training in New York, the unit will deploy to an unknown location.

His statement said the unit will deploy “in support of the global war on terrorism and to prepare for future contingencies as may be directed.”

Maj. Pete Rogers of the Maine Army National Guard said the unit’s nearly 500 members will be headed to the Middle East.

The battalion specializes in constructing buildings, bridges, roads and airfields. That kind of work is needed as the United States works to rebuild Iraq’s infrastructure following the war.

The 400 members of the 152nd field artillery, based in Aroostook County, have received an alert order, but have not yet been activated, Rogers said. An alert order gives guardsmen time to put their personal affairs in order before they are mobilized.

More than 400 Mainers already are in Iraq as part of National Guard and Reserve units. They include an air ambulance unit, a transportation unit, engineers from the 133rd who are serving with a Georgia engineer unit, an air traffic control unit and an air transport unit.