In late 2007, I received an e-mail from Omur, a gentleman in Bursa, Turkey, asking if I'd like some photos of Sahintepe today. I accepted his gracious offer.

The scenes should look quite familiar to Det 150 alumni, but for those who may be lost, I added some notes to help you find your way around the site today.

  If you look at the photo at the beginning of the TUSLOG Det 150 pages here on the site, you'll see how this scene looked when the diesel fuel tank was in place.

Until I saw these pictures, I had forgotten how predominant the retaining walls were to the rest of the site.

Here's where we used to enter the Top of the Mountain Lounge, the theater and the dining hall. While they've grown quite a bit, these are the same trees seen in the black and white "walking tour" photos.

You're standing in the dining hall now, by where the wall existed between that room and the site's base exchange.

Notice the floor tiles are still in place, although a bit weathered by the elements.  The raised portion is where the dining hall's steam table stood.  The slight rise prevented kitchen spills from coming into the dining area.   Imagine how many GIs ate in this dining hall in Sahintepe's over 30 years of operations?  If the walls could talk, the stories would be fascinating!

Are you lost?  This is the furnace and water heater room which adjoined the dining hall kitchen and the laundry room.  My friend Ray Margettin put in a lot of hours keeping that furnace and water heater running when it kept failing during the winter of '81-'82.

Finally, here's a view every Det 150 alumnus should recognize.  We're on the volleyball court and looking back toward the dormitory.

The commander and and superintendent suites were at the end of the building closest to you, followed by the Orderly Room (or as I called it "the Command Section") and then the rest of the dormitory rooms.  In the distance you can see the kitchen's chimney on the dining hall building.

Omur, the gentleman who took these photos, wasn't able to get any from the radio building level as there was a wild dog running around there.  (That's no surprise to me--we had the same problem in '81 and the Turkish Commander sent his troops out with rifles to take care of about six of them!)

A big Det 150 salute to Omur for providing these pictures!