30 years ago this month: Members of Naval Mobile Construction Battalion FORTY (NMCB 40)’s Air Detail drive through the streets of Mogadishu shortly after their arrival in Somalia, December 1992.
Dig the M16A1s and the Milverado
As noted by the U.S. Navy Seabee Museum, “The Seabees established base camps at each of the humanitarian relief sites and provided construction support to U.S. and Coalition Forces during Operation Restore Hope. They also built and repaired schools and orphanages for local Somalian children.”
Nicknamed “Fighting Forty,” NMCB 40 was formed 6 November 1942 and carved facilities out of raw Pacific foliage throughout WWII– earning an Army Distinguished Unit Citation while attached to the 1st Cavalry Division– then continued its mission in Vietnam and the Cold War. Then came a series of deployments throughout the GWOT.
Based out of Port Hueneme, California, it was decommissioned on 12 September 2012.