Armed forces with M-16s down the street from me.

reply to post by M0n0lyth


I was just going to post the same thing. It's summer. It's National Guard training time. These are just people putting in their two weeks. I bet that's exactly what they'd tell you if you asked, too.

All the people stating that they are there to protect oil company assets from pissed off Americans...yeah right. Not going to happen. It's either a drill or they are on National Security alert.

Camp Pendleton warns of tank noise over the next week

www.thevillagenews.com...

Could be part of the exercises?

Military Tank LongBeach style...

[edit on 14-6-2010 by antar]

I would say it's probably some sort of exercise. I been to San Pedro a lot of times and I know every year at this time they do a WWII reenactment of "Defending the Coast." Could have something to do with that. Also try and look on the weapons for Blank Firing Adapters, they are usually red or orange in color and square. They cover the barrel of the weapon.

Ill check georgias areas to see what's the drizzle in our area. I anticipate the outcome of what you have OP. THANKS FOR THE HEADS UP.

Its either training or something else. The else clearly being unknown. But in our current climate, it may be ugly.

BP has refining operations in Whiting, Indiana.

Anyone wanna go look there? I'm just far enough away (west side O'Chi Town) and I'll be working the rest of the week. (This is apx 40 ~ 50 miles from me).

Or - someone could look at Google Earth? I'm not too good with that, not too good with linking and posting things here either - and - I'm on a half fried Mac laptop here, so.

Anyone monitor Great Lakes shipping traffic? I might go look for some info on that.

There are many other refineries in the Calumet Harbor region of IL/IN also.

Ah.... too bad I have to work tomorrow! I wish I could go to the beach and just watch - I've seen all manner of unusual vessels way outside of shipping lanes with simple binoculars or an 80mm camera lens.

Might be a field trip for someone closer to the area and maybe I can go there this weekend.

ETA: I got lost in the docks of Long Beach, CA once - pretty disorienting and scary! I've also nearly driven into several canals and rivers here.

Lets all remember to be careful and respect other's property as well. As a suggestion for people who like to creep around weird spots for whatever reason - invest in the proper photography equipment, or borrow it. That way you don't have to trespass - the camera will do that for you




[edit on 14-6-2010 by Whiffer Nippets]

Since BP is in that area, maybe the soldiers are there in case of unrest (protest & etc), or in case of unrest due to trucks possibly unloading oil from the tankers...just a thought...

This is most likely a multi faceted event, the troops have probably been activated and have no real destination. It is not unheard of for our National Guard to be activated and spend days, weeks fully geared with no destination in mind by the higher ups.
And they were probably sent there to secure the oil tanks against potential Al sQuidda attack.
Another possibility is they are there in a high profile area as a sort of test spot to see if the public would rage or even notice. Future plans for more US soil deployment maybe.
All in all I wouldn’t sweat it yet, worry when they are driving en masse down your residential street. Then much like Iron Maiden said,
“RUN TO THE HILLS, RUN FOR YOUR LIIIIIIFE”.
Either way good lookin out!

I saw 4 convoys on I-40 heading east out of Barstow last sunday, all woodland camo under there own power. 20 vehicles min. per convoy, make of fuel tankers, humvies, troop transport. also saw about 100 humvies on flatbeds, woodland camo heading east on I-40. If I can figure out how to upload video I filmed most of them as they passed me.
I'm former 82nd Airborne, and something I believe is going to happen SOON. Get ready and good luck

The refinery is Philips (forgot about that one lol), and the location the OP took the video of is a staging area on a military base. the back side of the base has lots of training area, as well as a housing section with a school. The tent area might be for operations in the field within a training excercise in progress.

reply to post by Megiddodiddo



I've lived here over a year and traveled down that road almost every day.

I've never seen any troops there...or in Los Angeles for that matter. Anytime they 'train' it's usually on the outskirts of LA county.

Like I said, I haven't seen a soldier carry an M-16 since the riots back in the 90's.

reply to post by g146541

Ditto on the old and dumb signature.
At least we admit it !!!
Now we may have more reasons and more sophisticated reasons
to PANIC when we realize we just made another mistake !!!

reply to post by Prove_It_NOW


It looks to me like this may be just a National Guard training exercise, after all it is summer (when they typically go on their 2 week exercise). Also, next time you drive by, try to look at the barrel of their weapons, if there is a little square (usually red), it means their weapons have blanks in them, or are empty. It may be very hard to see these little red cubes or discern them from a muzzle break. Also, check to see if you notice magazines in the weapons. They should be banana shaped.

Just relax, they aren't going to shoot you and chances are, their weapons aren't even loaded. I bet that if you go up and ask them what they are doing - as a concerned citizen - someone might inform you as to what's going on. The local police dept. should also know what is happening. If you can, get a clear picture of one of their weapons and I might be able to tell whether it's empty or loaded with blanks. Don't worry, they won't shoot you, as another poster stated, "we aren't there yet".


--airspoon



reply to post by getreadyalready

I saw another Hummer in Tallahassee with a solid blue flag. (Anybody know what a solid blue flag means? No emblems, just solid blue.)

What shade of blue? Was it a light blue, as in baby blue? Baby blue is the color of the UN. Darker blue could just be some type of unit or personnel identification.


--airspoon

The army tanker trucks may give some kiind of clue to the drill, if thats whats happening.
Perhaps they are deployed to deliver fuel to a certain radius of their position.
Or some other refuelling type manouver...
Perhaps tank fuel to other exercises or a thousand other absolutely normal things.It would be nice to know what type of fuel those tankers have in them....helicopter even maybe?
Thumbs up on the pics
can anyone else cruise that location?

I wasn't afraid of them shooting me lol

It's because I look like I could be "Mid Eastern" (but not) and have a shaved head. Just didn't want any problems with "Hey, we have a suspicious guy asking questions and taking photos"

reply to post by JacKatMtn


Being in the NG for 9 years, I can tell you, this isn't standard proceedure. However, it doesn't mean they switched the training/FTX on military base to this location to do a mock up 'just in case'. With the NG now at the command of the US Gov instead of the states.. who know...

Originally posted by Prove_It_NOW
Okay, added the video to the OP.

in looking at the vid and some still closely, the first thing that comes to my mind is .. are these vechical actually US military? It could be BlackWater/Mercs.

I couldn't see any stincel on the fule tankers however, there are stincels located on the cargo hooks on the right side (where the bumber s/b) which is normal but, can't distinguish what it actally states.

I believe those tents are considered either GP medium or GP large, been awhile since I put up one ..

Each tent can house around 30 troops, from what I saw.. there are at least 3 tents I saw in the vid; that's a minimum of 90 personel. hard to distiguish exactally how many tankers are at the location. Since most military semi's carry only 2 ppl, If it's just for the tanker drivers there's WAY more personell there than just drivers..

Can't tell if the weapons are live either .. you won't know that by just driving by. If there's an ammo tent in there, I wouldn't think they would be loaded .. untill they are under a threat & the weapon over the shoulder are a way of saying 'keep out' ..

I can drive home that way too tomorrow to see for myself, I agree with others this is a drill only because they are based at Fort MacArther ten miles away which has no space because the General's golf course takes 99 percent of the fort. Can't park oil tankers on the par 5's!!!

Oh come on.

There is absolutely NO WAY you can tell driving by on the highway whether the soldiers have LIVE rounds or if their fingers are on the trigger.

And I would find it highly suspect that U.S. soldiers would walk around with fingers on the trigger. Short of shooting someone, getting caught with your finger on the trigger when you're not ready to shoot is the most serious offense on can commit during training exercises. Trust me, U.S. Army Soldiers would know better.

Two, did they point their weapons at you? I'd bet my month's salary that they were walking around with the weapons slung or at the low ready(pointing at the ground).

Three, a soldier will never be issued live rounds just to walk around garrison in the States. The Army keeps a very tight reign on ammo during peacetime operations. Soldiers will usually only be issued live rounds on the firing range and during select live fire exercises. They won't walk around a garrison area(place they sleep, with tents) with live rounds.

And even if they did, do you have x-ray vision? Did you go up and inspect one of their rifles to see if they actually had ammunition in their magazines?

During training soldiers routinely conduct operations with empty magazines to simulate real life but w/o the danger that live rounds possess.

What this sounds to me is a person who has no real knowledge of the army being paranoid and being afraid of guns.

Get real. These guys are out there training to protect you.

This is coming from a U.S. Army Infantryman so I am informed on the subject.

Oh, and the oil tankers... they're just fuel trucks. Army vehicles need fuel to operate. When you're conducting a training mission you need fuel. They bring it with them. What do you expect the Army to go fill up 30 humvees at the local 7/11?

[edit on 15-6-2010 by Dalamara]