I was one of ten lucky lottery winners from our Quantico Officers Spouses Organization to be selected to attend a tour of HMX-1. This is a serious high security place and they had to run a background check (or some such) on me just to make sure I qualified to “get in” and see the birds!
They showed us a video about HMX-1 and its history before taking us up to security to sign out our visitors badges and finally through the security door. We got to go up in HMX-1, walk around and sit in the VIP chairs! It’s stocked with Starburst candies, gum and some other treats and even has it’s own toilet in case someone needs to use it on the ever so short flights the President takes on it! An interesting tidbit, H stands for Helicopter, M stands for Marine, X stands for Experimental and the 1 because there is only 1 squadron of them! It was truly a once in a lifetime experience!