AL HILLAH, Iraq (May 19, 2003) -- Outside a brick factory in Al Hillah, Iraq, Marine engineer and explosive ordnance disposal specialists piled a number of Soviet-made 120 mm mortar rounds into a heap.

The mortar rounds weren't recovered from a secret weapons cache, but part of the battle debris that inundates every neighborhood and community in southern Iraq. The mass of munitions has become a primary focus for coalition forces since the end of hostilities, as more accidental discharges are reported -- many involving children.

The task of deactivating the deadly devices falls to the 1st Force Service Support Group

Thousands of tons of mines, rockets, and ammunition far outstrip the number of explosive ordnance disposal, or EOD, technicians, whose number here totals 88, according to Marine Capt. Ron Heflin, the First Marine Expeditionary Force's explosive ordnance disposal officer.

However, that number has been halved since a second EOD platoon returned home to Camp Lejeune, N.C. a few days ago.

CHERRY POINT, N.C. — After years of pressing for more and more explosive ordnance disposal Marines, the Corps expects to fill a shortage in that field by October.

As of May, there were 456 enlisted Marines with the primary military occupational specialty of EOD technician, according to information supplied by Marine Corps manpower officials. Additionally, 142 enlisted Marines have completed EOD training, and that puts the Corps at 90 percent of its requirement for 663 enlisted Marines.

The Corps “expects to attain 100 percent of the requirement by the end of FY08,” manpower officials said.

That’s good news for Marines in a job that has been in high demand due to the use of improvised explosive devices by insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. The demand has translated into high deployment tempos, as much as seven months on, five off.

“[Operation Iraqi Freedom/Operation Enduring Freedom] has brought EOD into the spotlight,” said Sgt. John Rudd, an EOD technician with the team at Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point, N.C. “We are now so much more visible. We’ve had to grow because IEDs have become a buzzword, because EOD has become a buzz job.”

SAN DIEGO — The Marine killed Tuesday in an explosion at a demolition range in Okinawa, Japan, was preparing to help destroy a World War II-era shell when it exploded, killing him and wounding two others on his team, III Marine Expeditionary Force officials said.

Officials are investigating the blast that killed Staff Sgt. John H. Roy III, 32, of Muscogee, Ga., and also wounded another Marine and a sailor, officials said Wednesday in a news release. The two wounded victims, who were not identified, were taken to the naval hospital in Okinawa for treatment, they said.