Engineering Aide 1st Class Michael McCarty

Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 25, Sturgeon Bay, Wis. Engineering Aide 1st Class Michael McCarty, a reservist serving as the leading petty officer in his battalion's operations department, is the kind of sailor who made the Seabees famous, his shipmates say. He was given 10 days to make repairs and improvements to a series of bridges in Iraq; it took him five. He worked directly with a Turkish supplier to make sure he got the right kind of concrete to build a runway in Iraq. And he helped the "Flying Nightmares" of Marine Attack Squadron 513 build a softball field to help improve morale. "He's one of those petty officers you can count on to get the job done," a shipmate wrote.