Navy – SoCal Bill McDonald

VROOM!

First let me share a bit of sight and sound from June’s NASCAR San Diego Weekend. This post has a lot of info about the event and my participation in it, but this is what the VROOM! title is all about. Up your volume!

(The Navy and NASCAR announced August 24 that NASCAR races will return to NAS North Island in 2027. July 30-August 1.)

June 19-21 was a distinctive summer weekend this year in San Diego. Yes, it was sunny with high temps in the low-to-mid 70s, so that was not so unusual.

But think of these terms and concepts being linked: San Diego and NASCAR, professional speed racing on an active military base. On that mid-June weekend, NASCAR held races in San Diego for the first time and those races took place on Naval Air Station, North Island. No other active US military base had ever hosted such activity.

Earlier this year, I saw that Sports San Diego, the non-profit that offers support to entities interested in holding sports events in this area, was seeking volunteers for NASCAR San Diego Weekend. Hey, that’s what I do. I applied. I was accepted.

NAS North Island is the northern end of the peninsula that creates the western edge of San Diego harbor. Just south of the air station is the city of Coronado, and the connection to the south is known as the Silver Strand. This likely explains it better than my words.

Access to Coronado and North Island is pretty much focused on the iconic San Diego-Coronado Bridge. Again, a picture communicates this better than words.

This is a screenshot from news coverage of the event and shows the amount of traffic waiting to enter Coronado on Sunday morning, day of the weekend’s main event. There is no charge to use the bridge, so this backup wasn’t because of toll booths. The relatively short route to the air station, however, goes through residential neighborhoods and features several traffic lights.

To avoid such traffic, I got a motel room for Thursday-Sunday in San Ysidro, just north of the border with Mexico, but a location that would allow me a straight shot up the Silver Strand. The exit off the 5 to the motel was 1B, less than a mile from the border.

On Thursday, June 18, I attended a briefing on NAS North Island and learned I was assigned to “Guest Services,” though the specific tasks were not then described. I also learned I was assigned to “Carrier East,” the zone adjacent to the berth occupied by USS Carl Vinson (CVN-70).

I also learned that volunteers were expected to park at San Diego State University and take a bus shuttle to the air station. That would, however, negate the whole advantage I had gained by getting the motel room in San Ysidro. And, unlike most of the volunteers, I was already eligible to park on the air station by virtue of being retired Navy.

Thus, early Friday morning I headed out and up the Silver Strand to arrive on base at about 7 am. I parked at the Commissary. I was a little concerned because the stated parking limit there was three hours. Based on the map provided us, I basically wandered over to where I understood volunteers were to check-in. It took me quite a while, but finally located it. The process was much easier on the weekend, as I had credentials for access at a more convenient location. (I received no citation for parking more than three hours at the Commissary on Friday and Saturday. Sunday was even better, as you’ll learn below.)

At the check-in, I received credentials, a ball cap, and a teeshirt (shown at right). For whatever reason, we received a new teeshirt each day. The first identified us as “staff,” the second as “volunteer.” I hoped the last one, on Sunday, day of the main attraction, would identify us as “Driver,” but it said “Staff” again. (There was no cost to us for the shirts and cap, or access to the event.)

This graphic shows the track layout, with east direction at top. “Carrier East” is on the lower right and it was designated the “yellow” zone.

“Carrier East” was adjacent to Turn 3 on the race course, a 90-degree turn to the left. More significant, in terms of “guest services,” was that it was the entry point for all those who arrived at the air station either by walking (from Coronado or by taking the ferry from San Diego) or ride services.

This was the scene Sunday, day of the main race, outside the entrance at Carrier East.

The race weekend attracted a total of 125,000 people over the weekend, several thousand of whom waited in lines like above. Most attendees had tickets that included parking on base, so these patrons had either walked to the base or used ride services.

Weekend attendees were from all 50 states and from 17 foreign countries. Surveys indicated two-thirds of them were attending their first NASCAR event.

Friday featured practice sessions for all three categories of vehicles and the Craftsman Truck Series race beginning in late afternoon. Additional practice sessions on Saturday preceded the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series for the lower-echelon cars, while Sunday featured the main event, the NASCAR Cup Series Anduril 250, starting in early afternoon.

On opening day, I was posted just inside the entrance at Carrier East, welcoming guests, handing out small souvenir packets, and answering questions. Not everyone, shall we say, was happy to learn that access to the main display area and start/finish line was about a mile away from Carrier East and with no option other than to walk.

There were trams connecting the three other main viewing areas — designated green, blue, and red (as shown in the track layout shown above) — but not at Carrier East.

On Saturday, I was moved to the viewing stands alongside the track from Turn 3 to Turn 4, parallel to the Vinson. My view of the O’Reilly AutoParts race is the video at the top of this post.

Approach to Turn 4. I guided people to seats in the bleachers at left.

Sunday was the day of the main event — the Anduril 250. (When I first came across the name Anduril, I thought it was the name of a medication. Uh, no. Unless it’s “bad medicine” for some. It’s the name of a major U.S. defense contractor that specializes in the newest sector of weaponry — autonomous systems, e.g., drones, submarines, unmanned aircraft. The name is taken from Lord of the Rings and is the legendary sword of Aragorn. You’ll see some of their products on display in the galleries further below.)

I had planned to repeat my parking on base at the Commissary on Sunday, but with that being the day of the main event, traffic was especially heavy and security was tighter. As I approached the Commissary parking lot, there was now a sentry there who signaled me to stop.

“Where are you going, sir?,” checking my ID. I told him the Commissary and he asked if I worked there. Learning I didn’t, he said I might well be towed if I parked there. “Are you going to NASCAR?,” he asked. I told him yes, and I was a volunteer. He gestured toward the parking lot across the street, intended for those stationed on base, and suggested I park there. Best parking of the weekend, even a shaded spot.

I was at my third posting for the main race, at the stands alongside the track from Turn 2 to Turn 3.

Cars often lifted off the track coming into Turn 2.

Photo below is looking east, with the 90-degree left Turn 3 ahead.

Here’s video (0:31 secs) of the top NASCAR entries coming through Turn 2. (Hard to miss the irrelevant “STOP” sign. A reminder of how this track overlay roads that formed the system supporting the base.)

The race was won by Corey Heim, his first NASCAR Cup victory. He was 10 seconds ahead of Bubba Wallace.

My shifts began at 7 am and ended at 2 pm on Friday and Sunday, noon-7 pm on Saturday. That gave me opportunities to spend a little time viewing the exhibits in the green area near the start/finish line. Below is a gallery of photos of some of those exhibits.

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As staff, I also had access to the “garage” area, where I could get a little closer to the race cars and see them in place rather than going by in a blur. Here is a gallery of some of those scenes.

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The telecast of the weekend events also included some great drone and blimp shots of the area. Here’s a gallery of some of those.

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Just to the north of NAS North Island is Point Loma, the location of several Navy commands, including a submarine base at Ballast Point. It is also the location of Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery. I found this a particularly gorgeous view of this amazing facility.

Post-NASCAR Weekend, it’s unclear whether it will be held here again. NASCAR, for many reasons, would like to hold another very popular event, bringing in so many new fans. Not sure about the Navy, or the residents of Coronado.

In addition to the inherent interference with “normal” base and town activities, there were also many logistical failures and shortcomings. Attendees complained about excessively long lines for refreshments, with many locations running out of food and drink long before the long lines were served. At my Saturday location, by mid-afternoon, all the portable toilets were filled, literally, to overflowing. Those who didn’t need to sit could use them, but the stench was really bad. Worse, they were in the same condition the following morning.

The event might end up a one-off, but it was a memorable weekend.

(As reported at top, NASCAR will indeed return to NAS North Island July 30-August 1, 2027. Vroom, vroom!)

Honoring Lowell

I had the privilege of attending a ceremony aboard the USS Midway Museum Friday, August 2, to honor Lowell Lindsay, a fellow Navy veteran.

Lowell and his wife, Diana, ran Sunbelt Publications, publishers of many volumes on the natural sciences, historical and cultural issues, and the San Diego region, for more than 30 years. Diana has a long association with the Anza-Borrego Foundation, serving as its President and as a long-time member of its Board of Trustees. I’ve been an ABF trustee for about a dozen years and President for the past four years.

In recent years, I’ve had the pleasure of getting to know the Lindsays. Conversing about our earlier years, Lowell and I came to realize we each served in the Navy in the Gulf of Tonkin, off the coast of northern Vietnam and southern China, in the summer and fall of 1969.

Lowell was a helicopter pilot, serving various roles, such as search-and-rescue, and conveying personnel and supplies among the ships in the Gulf. I was stationed on the USS Biddle (DLG-34), a guided missile “destroyer leader,” later classified as a cruiser. It’s possible, Lowell and I realized, that he may have landed on the Biddle as part of his duties.

Among the aircraft carriers his squadron operated from was the USS Midway and on the flight deck of the USS Midway Museum now is the actual helicopter he piloted.

Last fall, Diana had invited me to join her, Lowell, her son, and a couple of friends on a VIP tour of the Midway Museum that she had won in a raffle. I had posted about it. During the tour, Diana said later, she noted the presence of a pilot’s name on “Lowell’s helo.” She inquired about how Lowell’s name might be added. And then she brought it about.

She wanted to keep it a surprise for Lowell, however. Guests to the event on August 2 were aware of what was about to happen, but Lowell was kept unaware. He knew the event was to celebrate his and Diana’s 60th wedding anniversary. Which it was, as well.

Lowell and Diana at the lectern. Note the covering — blue stripes top and bottom — below the window of the helicopter.

At the lectern next to the helicopter, and before the collection of family and friends on the Midway flight deck, Diana talked about the couple’s anniversary and then directed Lowell’s attention to the helicopter. Below the window at the pilot’s station was a sheet of paper, evidently placed there to cover something. She urged him to remove it.

When Lowell removed the paper, he became quietly emotional (at right), while the group cheered. Under the window, it now read “LT LOWELL EDWARD LINDSAY.”

The rest of the afternoon was filled with “sea stories,” reminiscences among Lowell and fellow squadron mates, and hearty congratulations to Lowell and Diana.

Bravo zulu, LT Lindsay! And Diana!

The USS Midway Museum is berthed alongside the Navy Pier in San Diego Harbor. It is one of the most-visited attractions in San Diego and the most-visited maritime museum in the United States.

The flight deck offers four acres of open-air space 50 feet above the bay. It is the site of many events and spectacles.

To give a sense of the height of the Midway flight deck above Navy Pier.

Seoul 1991 – the ‘work’

Last December, when Korea was “in the news,” I put up a post — “Antsy at DMZ” — talking about my brief trip to the Joint Security Area on the border of North and South Korea in August 1991. In that post, I said I would be posting something about the rest of my trip to Korea “soon.”

“Soon” has finally come.

My “trip” to Korea was actually Special Active Duty for Training for me as a Naval Reservist, in addition to the mandatory two-week Active Duty for Training I had done previously that summer. I volunteered to participate in Ulchi Focus Lens 1991, a joint exercise between the US and the Republic of Korea (ROK). Indeed UFL was the largest computer-assisted simulation exercise in the world at the time, involving more than 200,000 troops from both countries. A fellow reservist who had previously participated vouched for its worth and I thought it a great opportunity to see Korea.

I flew from Oakland to LAX, where I connected with an LA-Seoul non-stop. I remember the flight as being about 11 hours, of which I slept about eight. Landing in Seoul as a member of the Navy, on orders, I had a distinctive process, requiring no passport. I had my Navy ID, my orders, and a special location for processing. Everything went smoothly.

Until I got to the hotel. I recall it was either very early or very late, because it was dark. When I attempted to check in at the Seoul Hilton, I was told there was no reservation in my name and no available room. Hmmm. I had contact info for no one and figured everyone was asleep. I milled about smartly. Somehow, I saw someone I recognized or he saw me. Within a surprisingly short time, I had a room.

I was told standing orders were to eat only at the hotel or on base, the nearby US Army Garrison Yongsan, headquarters for the Army in Korea. There had been an outbreak of cholera in the Korean capital. My first meal was at the hotel. I had read up on Korean cuisine, but was certainly a novice. As I looked at the menu, wondering what I should try, a Korean mother and two kids sat down at the next table. Great! I will listen to what they order. Two spaghettis and meatballs, with the kids splitting one.

I ordered, I believe, bulgogi, rice, and kimchi. Bulgogi means “fire meat” in Korean and is marinated grilled strips of beef. Kimchi is a salted and fermented mix of vegetables, mostly cabbage and radish, but with added peppers, etc. Maybe because most of the hotel guests were waeguk-saram (“foreigner” in Korean), the meal was not as spicy as it could have been.

After that, though, I stuck mostly to American stuff on the base (except for one major exception, to be described in the other post).

This exercise was the only time I wore cammies when I was in the Navy. In fact, I don’t believe the Navy had cammies as a uniform option at the time. There were green utility uniforms, pilot suits, etc., but not cammies. For the purposes of this exercise, we were to wear Marine cammies. As has been the case for a long time and remains so, the Army and Navy/Marines do things differently. (I realize I’m getting down in the weeds here, but this is for the record.) Army officers wore the symbol of their rank on the front of their caps, which are rounded, not peaked like the Navy/Marines. We wore the officer’s crest on the front of the cap and the insignia for rank, in my case silver oak leaves, on the blouse collar.

I found it amusing when I walked around the base and Army enlisted men were walking toward me. Everyone in the military has to pay attention to the rank of the individual whom you are approaching, because you are required to salute someone of higher rank, unless both parties are enlisted, not officers. Enlisted have to salute all officers. I could see enlisted guys scanning me, trying to figure out what I was. The rank wasn’t on my cap. There was just this unusual “thing.” Was this guy from a foreign army? They usually figured it out by the time we got close. My uniform did have a patch saying “US NAVY.” I don’t remember if anybody failed to recognize what I was. I wouldn’t have chastised them, in any case.

My role in the exercise, considering this all being “computer-assisted,” was very low-tech. I recall it being something like “messenger.” I think I had to walk among various exercise locations bringing “classified” material. I remember most that it was a lot of walking. First time I’m wearing cammies, it was also the first time I’m wearing combat boots. As any foot soldier knows, new boots can be no fun when you have to use them a lot in a short period of time. I was in pain the first several days. I guess some might consider it payback for what was generally a pretty easy time for me in the Navy.

Two things I remember particularly from the exercise. One was that while, for me, this was something of a lark, it was nothing like that for the ROK Navy types involved. They were in the military service of a country technically still at war with the regime only 35 miles away, and the careers of ROK officers might be determined by what happened in this exercise. I saw ROK officers be very harsh with subordinates, verbally and even physically.

A more pleasant recollection involved language differences. There was discussion of North Korean “mini-subs.” Maybe because it looked as if I didn’t have a lot to do, one Korean approached me asking about the difference between “mini” and “small.” I think he was confused, because North Koreans couldn’t be using miniature submarines. I said that, in this case, the term meant small, not miniature. Noticing that he and I were about the same size, I said, “We’re small, but we’re not miniature.” He nodded, chuckling. A few minutes later, he came back to me, and said, “Remember, the smallest pepper is the hottest pepper!” 🙂

There will be another post about my walks around Seoul as a tourist, with videos.

Awash

Last week, I joined fellow Navy League members, some Navy Junior ROTC cadets, a member of the Naval Sea Cadet Corps, and guests on visits to Navy facilities in Coronado.

Our first visit was to Beachmasters Unit ONE on the Naval Amphibious Base, Coronado. I pointed out to the Commanding Officer of that unit that I had served on that base 1970-71, which was likely before he was born. He was open-mouthed when I showed him pictures of the base at the time.

Anyway, after getting a briefing, viewing their vehicles, and handling some of their weapons, we all headed down the Silver Strand to a beach and took a ride. We went out to sea . . . briefly . . . on a LARC (Light, Amphibious, Resupply, Cargo) vessel. As the second wave broke, it washed over the port front quarter of the vessel, over me sitting there, and over my video camera. The camera kinda shorted out shortly thereafter. I used my iPhone during the rest of the day. I still don’t know if the camera, since dried out, will work again. I had detached the battery and misplaced it.

I was able to retrieve the SD card and to download the video files off it, however. I may have lost a video camera, but I got the shot!

In the afternoon, we went on a tour of the USNS Brashear (T-AKE-7), a dry cargo ship, manned by civilians, but doing work for the Navy. Huge ship. According to the Health app on my iPhone, I climbed 14 stories that day and I believe nearly all of them were aboard the Brashear.

You can see highlights on the video below. The young woman in the intro freeze-frame was the Naval Sea Cadet on the tour, a high school senior and a member of the unit supported by our Navy League Council. The Naval Sea Cadet Corps and school-based Navy and Marine Corps Junior ROTC programs are quite popular in Southern California.

Antsy at DMZ

I’m not sure if something can be both timely and 26 years old, but this might be. In 1991, I spent three weeks or so in South Korea, participating in a joint naval exercise — US and Republic of Korea. A while back, I finally digitized video of my visit to Korea, which includes one of the first activities — a visit to the “Joint Security Area” at the DMZ. Below is a relatively short (for me) video, 7:31, of that part of my time there.

That introductory photo is me at the main gate of the Army base at Yongsan, in Seoul, where much of the “war gaming” aspect of the exercise took place.

The Navy contingent to which I was assigned, being the Navy of course, was “billeted” in the Seoul Hilton. That said, we were advised to eat only on base and at the hotel because there was an outbreak of cholera. I did get out and sightsee, beyond the DMZ, but that’s another, much longer :), video soon to come.

While I was in Korea, there was something of a kerfuffle in the former Soviet Union — an attempted coup by hard-liners against Boris Yeltsin. Tanks around the Parliament building, etc. That set off the North Koreans a bit, and there were reports of exchanges of gunfire along the DMZ. I thought, “Great, three weeks in Korea and now is when the war breaks out again.” Feelings something like that may be pretty common in Korea these days.