PYEONGTAEK, South Korea — The U.S. Navy Seabees who worked closely with Marines at Camp Mu Juk for more than a decade, have departed South Korea, officials said.
The Seabees built and repaired things and did the cooking at the big galley at Mu Juk, an 84-acre logistics base outside the east coast port city of Pohang. The camp provides showers, shelter and other support to Marines who come to South Korea for annual exercises and training.
“There is no Seabee presence here,” Lt. Col. Mark Giorno, Camp Mu Juk’s commander, said last week. “The last man left early [last] month.”
They returned to their home station at Port Hueneme, Calif., the Navy said.
Because of a multimillion-dollar upgrade now under way at Mu Juk, cooking, maintenance, and construction tasks are being turned over to civilians, freeing the Seabees to use their skills elsewhere, officials said.
Seabee Detachment Mu Juk, part of Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 1 at Port Hueneme. served at Mu Juk since the late 1980s, according to Petty Officer 1st Class Lisa Wassilieff, a Navy spokeswoman in Seoul.
Twenty-seven Seabees are still stationed at Chinhae Naval Base in South Korea. That unit is Seabee Detachment Chinhae, part of Naval Construction Battalion 3 at Port Hueneme.
The Mu Juk Seabees rotated through the base on six-month deployments, carrying out construction projects and routine repair and maintenance.
Last year it was the Mu Juk Seabees who built the camp’s three shower buildings for the Marines’ use when they deploy to the area for training.
The Seabees also operated the camp’s 750-person galley, which has since been torn down and replaced with one that serves 100 people at a sitting. Civilian workers are being hired to staff the new galley, Marine officials said.
About 45 Marines are currently assigned to Mu Juk.