Thank you for posting this! I was a MP at El Toro from '94 to '96. I spent many a day and night at that guard shack at the main entrance ("Alpha 1"). As you enter the base, that building to the right was where visitors would get their passes and vehicle decals were issued. It's kind of sad to see how little remains. It was a great place to be a young, unattached Marine.
I feel the same way. Sad to see. I was an MP at El Toro for only 6 months right out of Boot Camp. I was there from July 1982 until January 1983 then I went to MCAS Iwakuni, Japan. Great times at both places.
As bizzare as it sounds , a part of me really misses this place . it took a beating over the 25 years ive been gone. I wish it would have been saved we had some good times there.
Thanks for sharing; I lived in El Toro back in the early 60's as a child, recently heard that the base relocated to former Miramar NAS. I noticed base housing is gone, elementary school is gone, etc. I remember watching F-86 Sabre jets exercise taking off at night with afterburners (pre-Vietnam). Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for making this video. I was stationed there at MCAS El Toro in 1981 and again in 1995. I also was able to drive through the base after it had closed. Probably around 2010 or so. The once clean kept up base looked like a ghost town. Appreciate you posting this video. Thanks.
I went on terminal leave from El Toro in Sept 1980. I did go back a few years ago to see what I could see. I could see across the field the hangar where I spent my last 2 1/2 years on active duty. To me it was like going to a grave yard... very sad!! VMA (AW) 121, Green Knights. A-6E Fire Control...
What a nice ride. My brother an I were just talking on the phone about this ride. We grew up here with our dad working at the base.. We were there all the time and I remember that old guard shack like it was yesterday, but to see it in another world was truly fascinating.. Thanks
I enjoyed taking this tour. Many friends and neighbors who were stationed there and been there on many occasions. Still sad that it was not the base it once was. Since Facebook, I made several video tours around Tustin. Old friends and classmates wanting to see their old stomping grounds. When I met my wife she was working at Taco Bell, Newport Ave & Mitchell Ave 1981. That just shut down last month, October 2013. The base tour would have been longer but I really wan't sure I was supposed to be there. Front gates were usually locked so it was a little hurried.
@3:10 the Quonset hut shown next to the generals building belonged to the MWCS 38 Det-B Wire shop and across the parking lot would have been the Det-B Tech and Radio shops and at the rear their Admin office building.
That’s correct. I was there in ‘81. It was my first duty station and I was with MWCS-38 MUX plt. I was stationed there again but with MTACS-38 in ‘95-‘97.
I'm sure that brings back some memories. We very well could have both been there at the same time in 78. I was in HS and my friend's dad was stationed there. Hung out there many times.
In the early 1970's the base commander outlawed motorcycles on base and they had to be parked across from the main gate at a gas station. Nixon landed there all the time and since I was a stupid 17 year old kid going through aviation ordnance school I didn't think about getting a camera wish I would have. oh yeah I had a honda 305 scrambler
The Marines weren't lucky like the chair force with a list of desirable duty stations. El Toro and K' Bay were as about as good it got for us. And few of us ever got them. The US Army promised its enlistees service in Europe. While the Marines were treated to the Rock the Stumps and Parris Island.
Everyone was pretty sad when they heard the base was going to close. I remember my mother said she always felt safe when there were Marines around. And always there if she needed help.
Does anyone remember Staff Sargant Pittman at the front gate? He was a Medal of Honor winner in Vietnam but I could never find out what he exactly did. God bless him.
Great vid. Whats the current status of the place? I would love to photograph those abandoned buildings, if they are still there. Is the housing track still there?
Everything should still be there. Went by about 4 months ago. I think they ran out of funding for clean up and the Great Park so probably going to be there a while.
In 1984 i went to California for a vacation with my family. My uncle Dennis was in the USMC as an enlisted man. He was on manuevers but was stationed at El Toro MCAS. My cousin Dawn told me that in 1983 her dad caught my cousin Geremy masturbating and took off his bedroom door to get him to stop that behaviour. In 1992 geremy got kicked out of the US Army Rangers in boot camp for his behaviour, ( not masturbating ) being an racist insubordinate jackass. Geremy got an bullshit medical discharge because of his dad's Marines career, 20 years plus. Geremy became a cop in the LASD than the LAPD and was involved in the Rampart scandal. Before any asks my uncle had just put my cousins Geremy's door back on in the start of 1984 and my cousin Dawn told me this because he was bothering meafter we got to the house after getting to California.
Had to do with the Clinton drawn down and base re-alignment bull crap after the Gulf war, They gave it back to the city or the state. I think the Marine Corps went from 225,000 Marines to 175,000 in a very few years.
