This is in response to USMC EOD Duty on another Military Forum

[Richard Turner/Turner Saddlery]

Sir:

I have a special appreciation for what the EOD folks do. I was in from 77-97, and never saw combat. I was an MP from 77-82 and then went into CID at Camp Lejeune, also assigned to NIS during my tour. Used your folks many times. Was later assigned to MCB CamPen, had the field office at Camp DelMar.

While at Lejeune, was duty agent on a Friday when I got a call from the MP Desk. Said they had a problem at ReconBn out at Onslow Beach. I responded and met with the SgtMaj. They were re-inspecting one of the Recon barracks before they issued liberty cards for the weekend and found a PFC had been pinching plugs off of C4 and squirreling it away in his wall locker. He had two mess hall coffee cups slap full and a half a dozen various animal figurines made of the stuff. He saw no harm in using it for modeling clay. When the duty EOD arrived on the scene, he estimated combined it was over 2lbs. Said it would have leveled the old quonset style building plus probably destroyed the adjacent huts.

Also had a kid, another PFC roll up to the Triangle Outpost Gate during a CG gate inspection with a dud frag in a shoebox. Good thing they caught him, he had it wrapped up, ready to send home to his mom as a souvenir. Wasn't even padded, just rolling around in the box. The MP that found it was a young LCpl and he wasn't worth a sh@t for the rest of the day. I told him everything was under control, to calm down, because he was as white as a ghost. He replied that it would have turned a dark green Marine white. I know I could think of many other stories, but those two stand out in my mind concerning EOD.

Semper Fi,

Richard

[Michaelp]

We used pinches of C-4 to heat stuff.
I had to check the ones my "Yards put out when we stopped at night. They often robbed it out of their own claymores.
It takes a good sized impact to set it off. Not sure a hammer could do it.
Guy was still a numbnut for doing this.

GIs need constant monitoring-one never knows what they might be up to.
have seen a few sad incidents that were really unnecessary.

[joem]

That's what we used to heat C Rats up. You can only choke down so many cold Rats.