MARINE CORPS AIR STATION IWAKUNI, Japan -- After undergoing a $1.3 million cosmetic facelift, the Single Marine Program Hornet’s Nest here is scheduled to have a “Rock the Block” Grand Opening celebration 4-8 p.m. July 30.
The renovations consisted of leveling the floor; installing new flooring and wall coverings; updating the heating, ventilating and air conditioning system, as well as the plumbing; and installing a wireless Internet network.
The purpose of the project was to make the facility more comfortable and functional for the service members who use it.
The project was sponsored by station facilities and Marine Corps Community Services. During the renovations, the Marine Lounge, located on the second floor of the Crossroads Mall, remained open, and a temporary Cyber Café was set up next to the Wood Hobby Shop.
“I’m below an E4, so I can’t get my license until I’ve been on station for more than a year,” said Lance Cpl. Hewan Musie, station Installation Personnel Administration Center clerk here. “The SMP is the perfect place to hang out, keep in touch with family and friends, and go on trips with. I’m looking forward to the reopening.”
Single and unaccompanied service members are invited to attend the grand opening to enjoy food, drinks, a live disc jockey, door prizes, obstacle course, sumo wrestling matches, a taiko drum performance and a variety of tournaments, including Texas Hold 'em, billiards, Rock Band and ping pong.
The Hornet’s Nest is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week and offers recreational activities, trips, community relations events and volunteer opportunities.
The Hornet’s Nest has a television and movie lounge with more than 3,500 movies, a Blu-ray player and surround sound. There’s a room available for gamers with a PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3 network, X-Box Live and Nintendo Wii.
For all outdoor recreational needs, the Hornet’s Nest gear issue provides free equipment for camping, picnics, snowboarding and more. Patrons also have access to ping pong, billiards, air hockey and foosball tables, and a full-service gym with lockers, a sauna, showers and towels.
The Single Marine Program here is the only one in the Marine Corps, and maybe even of all the different services’ programs for single service members, to have saunas and showers in their gym, to be open 24 hours a day and to support service members while on deployment, said Jay Stovall, SMP coordinator and deployment support coordinator here.
“One of the reasons that the Single Marine Program is stronger here is because of our population,” said Stovall. “The majority of the active-duty military on this base are single and unaccompanied, so with the demographics, it makes sense that the SMP should be well driven here.”
If there are more than 300 service members from Iwakuni deploying for more than three weeks to a location with less availability than what they’re used to in Iwakuni, the Single Marine Program here will deploy with them.
“We are here to make the quality of life for the single and unaccompanied service members as pleasant a tour of duty in Iwakuni as we can,” said Stovall.
“We've been in a fox hole, and we've been in sleeping bags in the cold. We've lived in the barracks when there were three of us sleeping in a room. We didn't even have a TV. We've been there, we understand, and we do what we can to make the quality of life better.”
For more information on Single Marine Program events and activities, call the main office at 253-3585 or stop by the Hornet’s Nest, near the north side Marine Mart.