TBT…

One of those places that ‘literally’ was for the birds…

Midway Approach

Any guesses???

Rather than tease you, it’s home to Japanese glass floats, Gooney birds, and strange things like tennis shoes, lumber, and other flotsam/jetsam that ends up in the Pacific…

Midway and Eastern IslandsBetter known as Midway Island…

Spent quite a bit of time there in the 1970s for various reasons…

HERE is a description of Eastern Island, built out in 1941.

And HERE is a link to what’s happening over there these days. The old hangar is where we actually bunked when on alert out there (no AC or fans unless you brought one or swiped one from an office). The Air Force always got there first and booked the ENTIRE barracks for their crews and maintainers.

Hate to see that they’ve pretty much destroyed, or let rot almost 100 years of history to protect the Gooney birds, but I guess they’re more important now than capturing history.

Oh yeah, the comment about glass balls and tennis shoes? Well, the Pacific currents push anything that falls in the water in the western Pacific toward the US. We used to make good money picking up glass balls and taking them back to Honolulu and selling them, they definitely paid for the few nights we got at the club…

 

Comments

TBT… — 19 Comments

  1. Total WAG – Laguna Atascosa Wildlife Refuge, Rio Grande Valley Texas ?

  2. Was the desalinization plant up and running?

    (Imperial Naval Intelligence wants to know…)

    I actually did guess Midway. Saw it in the distance once, from altitude.

  3. That’s just one more depressing thing. However I am sure that happy Goonie Birds are key to America’s future, as is the weather.

  4. Even after the stories I heard from the Seabees at the time, re: Midway, this makes Adak look better & better.

  5. Well it certainly isn’t Marcus Island, cause it’s too big.

  6. I spent a several hours there back in ’63 for refueling and commissary raiding. I though then that I would hate to be stationed there. Mainly because there was no Waffle House and any women there were married. But I guess, after several months, those gooney birds would start to look attractive. They were funny to watch while they took off and landed.

  7. Guessed Midway right off.
    There are advantages to war gaming.
    None that are financially rewarding but advantages all the same.

  8. Hey old NFO;

    “The Japs blew through Major Parks fighter….!” I saw the pic and guessed “Midway”

  9. What do you mean about preserving the Gooney Bird? What does a C-47 have to do with wildlife?

    I suppose that if the wildlife is occupying a runway the Gooney wants to use, well, then… turn loose a big, happy dog.

  10. Another god-forsaken hole that the Army of the ’80s didn’t spend much time at. Nice pics though, I bet the fishing was awesome.

  11. Spent some time there on and off for Pony Express ops (remember those?) and it was actually one of the best kept secrets around….you could forget the office, forget the C.O., and just fly with some really interesting guys. Ever watch a C-130 put a 6′ wide drogue out the rear hatch on a bungee cord to pick up sea water? (at 180 knots)…the Herc nearly stops dead in the air before climbing out; or dropping a used sonobuoy tube out for the Soviet sailors on the AGi’s below (after stuffing it with Hustler and Playboy magazines and some decent bourbon. Good times.

  12. Some of the clearest water on earth, drop a dime and you could still see it on the bottom 30 feet down.
    Watching the birds face into the wind then step of a sand bank about a foot high, pop their wings out and start gliding.

  13. Spraying Roundup!? To protect the Gooney’s? I stopped using that stuff a few years ago! Monsato’s gift to the slow death of us all thru poisoning of out food!

  14. Rick- You’re welcome!

    Paw- It was GOOD fishing! 🙂

    Haze Gray- We must know each other… I did that stuff too… mid-late 70s 🙂

    Jon- Yeah, that was a trip, because when they tried ‘running’ and launching it didn’t always work so well…

    Ev- OH yeah, NO common sense on their part…

  15. I think I lagged you a year or two; my time in that part of the world was ’79 – ’82. Clipper Troop or Guardian Bear open up any memory lockers?

  16. I did guess Midway, mostly because the Battle of Midway in WWII has always fascinated me, both because the fleets never physically saw each other and because the island is so very tiny. Just one of those fascinating contexts that wars create.