Joe Chiro & Det 150 Info Bluejeans' Place

Joe Chiro, who wore only two stripes at Sahintepe, recently wrote me about his year on the mountain, saying, "I was stationed at Det. 150 from December 1966 to December 1967 as a Radio Relay Equipment repairman (Tropo)...was there for the earthquake at Adapazari, as well as the Arab Israel war."

Joe sent some of the earliest pictures I've seen of Det 150 at Sahintepe, including some black and white photographs.

Here's a very familiar place to all of us, the dining hall...it looked much the same in 1981 including the serving line when I was there!

And the next room over, the recreation room AKA "The Top of the Mountain Lounge"

Up the many steps to the radio building was the maintenance office...

...and outside were the original mobile antennas and the radio van supporting special communications needs.

Joe let us in on some background on the antennas and the radio van saying, "the equipment van was there until near the end of my tour. It was replaced by the FRC 75 and the billboard antennas."

Joe noted in a recent e-mail, "That year in November there was the Greece-Turkey problem, where they were ready to go to war over Cyprus. Just a little scary, since I was ready to leave in a month, and they closed the airports! We sent over Cyrus Vance, who was fortunately able to negotiate a compromise. I don't know about the Greeks, but the Turks were ready to go to war. It was certainly not an uneventful year. By the way, there were 155 steps going up (I counted them on one of my numerous trips :-) ).