Consolidated by U.S. Navy Seabee Museum, Naval History and Heritage Command
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Seabee sign on Bougainville Island, part of the Solomon Islands archipelago, Jan. 2, 1944. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. Navy Seabee Museum)
Early January
1991: U.S. Marines began to move north in preparation for the expected ground assault on the Iraqis. In support of this, the Seabees began to concentrate on building and maintaining roads to serve as the main supply routes throughout northern Saudi Arabia.
After months of constructing millions of square feet of aircraft aprons, camps for tens of thousands of Marines, and hundreds of acres of ammunition and supply points, the Seabees prepared to support the ground assault into Kuwait. NMCB 5 moved half its strength to Al Kabrit, 30 miles from the Kuwaiti border, and began construction of a Naval Construction Force Logistics Support Base from which the Seabees could provide the First Marine Expeditionary Force the construction support needed during the upcoming assault into Kuwait. The top construction priorities during this period were water, roads, and facilities for the Marine division assembly areas. Water was obtained by exploiting already-existing wells, and the Seabees built galley facilities for the 30,000 Marines of the 1st and 2nd Marine Divisions. A 40,000 man capacity enemy prisoner of war camp was also built.
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Petty Officer Second Class Michael Cowart smooths concrete during construction of a Marine camp in northern Saudi Arabia. Cowart is a member of the Naval Mobile Construction Battalion Five operating during Operation Desert Storm in February 1991. Photographed by CWO2 Ed Bailey. (NHHC Photograph Collection, Navy Subject Files, Seabees)
The most formidable task facing the Seabees was the road network required by General Schwarzkopf's "End Run" attack strategy. Spanning more than 30 miles of desert from Al Mishab to Al-Kabrit, the "End Run" strategy ultimately required more than 200 miles of roads west and north of the Kuwaiti border. Because of the need to deceive the Iraqis, much of the construction necessary had to be done at the last minute. Working in the wettest weather seen in Saudi Arabia in years, Seabees completed the necessary construction in approximately two weeks. Thousands of trucks moved million of gallons of water and fuel, and tons of supplies, ammunition and spare parts on this road network to support the two Marine divisions making the assault. By the time the assault was launched, Seabees were maintaining approximately 200 miles of roads near the Kuwaiti border. One of these roads was an east-west corridor from Ras Al Mishab through Al Kabrit, continuing past Al Qaraah for a total distance of almost 100 miles. This six-lane road was traversed daily by more than 500 heavy haulers and thousands of tactical vehicles.
January 5
1942: The Bureau of Navigation (now the Naval Personnel Command) approved Admiral Ben Moreell s request for authority to recruit skilled craftsmen and artisans to man a Naval Construction Force. The original authorization was for a Naval Construction Regiment composed of three Naval Construction Battalions. This approval, in effect, was the actual beginning of the Seabees. Authorizations for additional battalions soon followed in rapid sequence.
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Rear Adm. Ben Moreell gives a brief prologue and epilogue highlighting the Seabees standing as a new force within the U.S. Navy. (Obtained from the National Archives at College Park - Motion Pictures)
1943: ACORN 3 arrived at New Caledonia.
January 6
1945: A Seabee whose unit was attached to a Marine Division doubled as a combat pilot during the invasion and battle for Cape Gloucester, New Britain. Machinist's Mate 1st Class Chester J. Perkins of NCB 19 flew a total of 218 hours, 105 of them during combat as the pilot of a light, unarmed reconnaissance plane. He made daily flights over enemy territory to transport rations and supplies to isolated jungle patrols and to spot for artillery batteries. In addition, Perkins carried blood plasmas to Marines wounded during the invasion operations and dropped medical supplies while fighting was still in progress. Perkins operated mostly from crude, improvised landing strips, usually roadways and sand bars. On one occasion, a fusillade of enemy bullets pierced the cabin floor of his tiny plane. Fortunately, all of them missed him. For his outstanding accomplishments, Perkins was awarded the Navy Air Medal on Jan. 6, 1945.
1967: The first aircraft of the advance party of NMCB 133 arrived in RVN.
1968: The first advance party of eight officers and 137 Seabees of NMCB 8 departed the continental United States (CONUS) via C-130 aircraft for deployment to RVN.
1970: 21st NCR Detail Yankee (of UCT 1) departed Davisville, Rhode Island and deployed to Atlantic Undersea Test and Evaluation Center (AUTEC) for test emplacement of the Project AFAR array.
January 7
1946: Last section of 38th NCB inactivates at Yokosuka, Japan; 17th Special NCB inactivated on Leyte, Philippines.
1970: Seabee Team 0410 returned to Construction Battalion Center (CBC), Port Hueneme, California from Vietnam.
January 8
1943: 64th Naval Construction Battalion (NCB) commissioned at Camp Bradford, Norfolk, Virginia.
1946: 47th Naval Construction Regiment (NCR) inactivated; 4th Special NCB inactivated at Okinawa.
1968: Naval Mobile Construction Battalion (NMCB) 8 s advance party arrived on board at Camp Wilkinson, RVN.
1970: Seabee Team 7102 arrived at Davisville, Rhode Island from Vietnam for reassignment to NMCB 7.
1973: Seabees of NMCB 71 complete construction of a geodesic dome at the new Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station. Over the next few decades, the dome becomes the iconic image of the South Pole station.
January 9
1969: Seabee Team 0914 completed training at the 31st NCR and deployed to Camp Kinser, Okinawa, on a C-118 aircraft from Naval Air Station (NAS) Point Mugu, California.
January 10
1942: The first man received at Quonset Point, Rhode Island for the newly formed construction force was Shipfitter 1st Class Robert Thomas Adams, USNR, from Newport, Rhode Island. He arrived on January 10, 1942. Adams was not the first man enlisted, but because of the alphabetical sequence of his name, he appears in the original construction battalion books as the first Seabee.
1943: 68th NCB commissioned at Camp Bradford, Norfolk, Virginia.
1946: 37th Special NCB inactivated at Oahu, Hawaii.
1967: Seabee Team 0510 deployed to the Republic of Vietnam (RVN).
January 11
1959: The men of Mobile Construction Battalion (MCB) 10 boarded the USNS Daniel Sultan at Guam, Mariana Islands for transfer to their homeport at the Naval Construction Battalion Center (NCBC), Port Hueneme, California. MCB 10 was established on Guam in 1952. This establishment was actually a re-designation of the last active World War II Naval Construction Force unit, the 104th Naval Construction Battalion, under its new mission concept as a mobile land-based construction battalion. Until its recent disestablishment in July 1976, MCB 10 was the only construction battalion in continuous operation since World War II.
1967: Five NMCB 8 personnel were wounded in an enemy mining incident approximately 12 miles south of Chu Lai, RVN on a road leading from Route 1 to the 2/7 Marines Echo Company area. The vehicle involved was well sand-bagged and as a result, the personnel injuries were relatively slight. The two men in the cab of the vehicle were air evacuated to the First Medical Battalion.
1968: NMCB 7 s Detail Alpha Nine returned from Khe Sanh, RVN to Camp Adenir after being relieved by NMCB 53 personnel; Seabee Team 0602 arrived in Saigon, RVN. The team moved by convoy to Phuoc Tuy Province, RVN on January 22, 1968.
1971: NMCB 4 main body departed Okinawa for the continental U.S. (CONUS).
2005: NMCB 40 Seabees arrived in Sri Lanka in response to the December 26, 2004 tsunami that devastated Southeast Asia. Other Seabees from NMCB 7, 30th NCR, and Underwater Construction Team (UCT) 2 arrived within days to Sri Lanka and Thailand to provide disaster relief and survey port facilities.