Marines shift mission to Sinlaku recovery on Tinian

From their storm-battered barracks at the Tinian Oceanview Hotel—a blue-hued property built from shipping containers now showing signs of disrepair, with sand slowly reclaiming what was once green grass—U.S. Marines have pivoted from routine operations to full-time disaster response in the wake of Super Typhoon Sinlaku.

With borrowed U.S. Navy heavy equipment, including bulldozers rumbling in the background, Marines Staff Sgt. Jacob Akeley said their detachment—part of the Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 1 attached to 7th Engineer Support Battalion—has been focused on clearing critical access routes across the island.

“Yeah, we’ve been on Tinian for a while now,” Akeley told Marianas Press. “Actually, we were already pre-positioned here for some other missions, but since Sinlaku, we’ve been out here kind of basically just clearing up the main roads, making sure emergency vehicles can pass and stuff like that.”

He said the Marines’ immediate task has been to push debris off roadways to restore two-lane access, with more extensive cleanup operations expected.

“And hopefully we have some additional tasking in the future to kind of start removing all the debris, bringing it to the recycling centers and stuff like that,” he said.

The debris field reflects the force of the storm.

“We’ve seen anything from palm trees and branches to power lines, a bunch of coconuts, and definitely a lot of the tin roofs and stuff that are used out here for shade structures,” Akeley said. “So yeah, basically we’ve been just consolidating that on the side of the road, out of the way enough to have vehicles pass in two lanes, and then future operations to get that out of the area entirely.”

While the Marines provide manpower, much of the heavy lifting is being done with Navy equipment.

“So the Marines, we actually don’t have any equipment. Because we are attached to the Navy, we’ve been using theirs,” he said. “But they have multiple tractors and trucks of all sorts of sizes and capabilities that we’re able to load up and use those buckets and the forks and stuff like that to move the initial debris.”

Akeley said the detachment is sufficiently staffed to sustain operations alongside Navy personnel.

“We do have a handful of Marines here, enough to kind of get the mission done and not have complacency and stuff like that. But yeah, we’re fully staffed to handle any of the missions along with the Navy personnel.”

The deployment is expected to last for months, depending on the pace of recovery.

“So we’ll be here for a little while. We’re expected to be here for at least a few months. If this takes shorter amount of time, then we’ll go back to our initial mission. But this is our main priority right now, absolutely,” he said.

Akeley described the typhoon’s impact as significant, though mitigated by stronger construction from past storms.

“Having a Category 4, Category 5 hurricane is definitely out of the normal. Tons of destruction,” he said. “I think Tinian has, I guess in the past with Yutu and the other super typhoons, has kind of rebuilt stronger, which is nice. Because when I woke up on Thursday after the storm, it was very surprising to see as many buildings still standing as there was.”

“Of course, the smaller stuff like the tin roofs and stuff, that comes and goes. Definitely a lot of destruction. But I think it could have been worse if they hadn’t prepared better in the past,” he added.

During the storm, the Marines were relocated as a precaution against storm surge.

“So we were staying down at Ocean View Hotel, but because there was a concern for the ocean flooding, they moved us up to Lorilynns Hotel. So we’ve been staying there, but we moved back down here earlier this week,” Akeley said.

He ended the interview with an upbeat message to the people of the island.

“Biba Tinian. Hopefully everyone comes out on the other side stronger and better.”