Summerfest Attracts 8,000 to Navy Base

Zachary Moser, a 5-year-old from Oxnard, got to horse around with a machine gun atop a Humvee all-terrain vehicle.

George Ely, a World War II veteran, marveled at the Navy’s top-notch destroyer, the Stethem.

And Len Koelbel, a member of the Navy’s underwater construction team, happily lost match after match, competing with children in a game of underwater tick-tack-toe.

They were among the estimated 8,000 people at the first day of the weekend-long Seabee Summerfest, the Naval Construction Battalion Center’s annual open house. The festival will continue today from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. with 8,000 more visitors expected.

Saturday’s proceedings started at 10 a.m. under cloudy skies with opening ceremonies attended by military and city officials.

An equipment parade followed and featured everything from humongous earthmovers and dump trucks to smallish armed military trucks. All the equipment is used by the Seabees in their military-site construction duties.

Visitors--lined up along the battalion center’s large blacktop area to catch a glimpse of the slow-moving, narrated procession--were startled when machine-gun fire rang out from the lead vehicle.

“I hope that’s not the beginning of a bang-bang, shoot-’em-up kind of afternoon,” said Simi Valley resident Richard Wolinski, 48, who decided to stop by on his way to the Ventura County Fair.

It wasn’t.

Soon the crowds dispersed and it was on to the rest of the festival’s activities, which included Seabee construction demonstrations, tugboat rides, military displays, live music, sports competitions, a car show, a carnival and more.

Many of the children could be found crawling around inside the various military trucks on display, receiving a crash course on how to operate a machine gun.

“I only have a pretend gun like a cowboy gun,” said Zachary Moser, after talking to naval weapons instructor Mathew Johnson. Zachary liked playing with the gun, he said, but didn’t think he would ever receive one for his birthday or Christmas.

“My mom doesn’t like very real guns,” he said.

Not all the children were caught up in guns, however. Many parents took their kids by a tank where members of the Underwater Construction Team were demonstrating diving techniques. Speaking via radio, divers talked and joked with visitors standing outside the tank.

“I’m having a blast and so are the kids,” diving team member Len Koelbel said. Using a black grease pen, Koelbel, 26, scrawled Xs and O’s inside the tank as children etched their marks on the game’s grid taped on the glass tank.

“He’s either letting me win or he’s not very good,” said a suspicious Brian Wilkerson, 10, of Port Hueneme.

There was one festival highlight that never got off the ground Saturday--the hot air balloon. A persistent stiff breeze quashed plans for the Navy to offer tethered rides on its colorful balloon emblazoned with yellow lettering. Coordinators said they would try again today.

The U.S. destroyer Stethem, docked at the port, was doing a brisk business.

Billed as one of the Navy’s foremost weapons systems, the guided missile destroyer saw many visitors Saturday.

“This ship is equipped with technology that is out of this world,” said George Ely, 75, a weapons systems specialist who retired form the Navy in 1973.

Ely, who lives part-time in Port Hueneme, was especially interested in the ship’s radar-absorbing outer skin, which is cushiony to the touch and helps it evade enemy radar.

“This festival is a good opportunity to get to know what the Navy and Seabees are all about,” he said.