Military Base Housing, Best Finds, Most Fun!

[AlaskaAng]

Hi All,

I was stationed at Kirtland AFB, NM from Jun 05 - Oct 06 and timing was perfect for detecting! A housing area of about 700 homes was scheduled for demolition in the coming months and I had permission to detect the yards before demolition crews arrived. The homes were built in the mid 40s and were occupied by USAF enlisted personnel. Most of the home were already vacant when I arrived.

The below pictures represent my finds from about 8-10 outings (8-hr hunts); I had a great time and got plenty of exercise! The nice thing about detecting these yards was there was little to no grass due to the recent drought...digging with my hand pick was very easy and fast! I didn't have to get too picky about how I filled my holes...just shove the dirt in and press!

In all, I found over 2,500 coins, of that, 33 were silver, 241 were wheaties and the rest either foreign, pennies or clad. I turned in $125 in newer coinage and put the $ towards a new Bullseye pinpointer! I also found a few silver and gold rings, USAF rank insignia, toy planes, cars, lots of marbles (eyeballed them) and keys!

I was able to sponsor some friends from my local metal detecting club (Albuquerque Metal Detectors Assoc) on base and we had a great time!

Enjoy the pics,
AlaskaAng

 

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[Shortstack]

Ang thats great. Sure wish they'd let us do that here at Vandenberg. The east housing is being torn down and being relegated to nature after all the structure is gone. Unfortuantely even after they are gone MD won't be allowed. When Vandenberg was called Camp Cook in the early 50-60s the Army used the areas around VAFB as target practice. Even though the sites were swept for unexploded ordinace they won't let you MD anywhere on VAFB. The old trailer housing area is also empty now and it would be another place that would produce great treasures.

Imagine not letting us MD just because of a litlle kaboom, jeez

Hello Calworks:
I was stationed a Vandenberg 1980 thru 1983. I recently used Google Earth to check out Vandy for any changes since we were there. (my youngest daughter was born in the base hospital.) Man, the street we lived on no longer exists. We were on the main base at 120 Tamarack--Tamarack and most other streets in that area were turned into culdasacs and renamed.

Anyway, the housing on the eastside was mostly NEW townhouse-style homes that WERE CONDEMED right after they were finished because of seriously BAD construction. The concrete floors developed large cracks and weeds were actually growing up in them. The condemnation happened just before we got assigned there.

I had no problems MDing. There were other detector folks besides me, too. Several of us were asked to help the Base Police locate some stolen jewelry a group of teen burglers threw out into a brushy area when the law closed in on them. We helped the OSI agents gather enough evidence for trial.

Do you ever go up to Pismo Beach for some MDing? Millions of people have played there.

 

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[Calworks]

Hey shortstack, yes the base had changed dramatically since I got here in 88', seen the hosp go from a 120 bed hosp to a clinic, I worked the hosp for 10 yrs before retiring here. Funny you should mention Pismo, I'm doing just that this coming weekend, should have lots to show, I never see anyone doing any MD and if they haven't that place is a gold mine of goodies, wish I had a beach detector so I could do the water line, my current MD isn't good for the wet sand.

I'll show everyone what I get if anything...maybe the reason I don't see people MDing there is perhaps they do a little night stalking

 

[jorge del norte]

that was my base for 3.5 years...........Kirtland AFB...........cool post!!!!!!!! 1992-1995

Big Crow , Argus program............

 

[Gilligan]

Awesome stuff!! Great finds and plenty of them! Bryan

 

[Derek752]

Ummmm ....WOW !