The Naval Weapons Station Seal Beach is one of the Navy's most important logistical installations, supplying ships of the Pacific Fleet with the weapons they need to remain a ready and effective fighting force in service to our nation in a rapidly changing world. The station is a major shore command with an assigned mission to provide quality and responsive logistic, technical, and material support in the areas of retail ammunition management and ordnance systems components, and is the site of the Naval Ordnance Center's Pacific Division headquarters.
Commissioned in 1944 at the height of World War II as the Naval Ammunition and Net Depot, the Naval Weapons Station has seen its mission change as developments in modern warfare have evolved. Originally established as an activity to receive, store, issue, and load ammunition for the fleet, the complex has developed into the Navy's premier weapons station. Besides readying approximately 250 ships each year with missiles, torpedoes, and conventional ammunition they require for deployment, the Naval Weapons Station has expanded its capabilities to include analyzing the performance of those weapons and using that data to extend their life expectancy and to ensure their reliability when issued to the fleet.
Redesignated a Naval Weapons Station in 1962, this command is the only Naval Weapons Station to share its area with a National Wildlife Refuge. Nearly 20 percent of the Seal Beach facility was designated a National Wildlife Refuge in November 1972. Working together with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Weapons Station and Wildlife Refuge provide a home for at least five endangered species - the California Least Tern, Light-footed Clapper Rail, American Peregrine Falcon, California Brown Pelican, and the Belding's Savannah Sparrow. They live here, protected in the salt marsh of the Anaheim Bay. Once stretching from Anaheim Landing to the bluffs overlooking the present day Bolsa Chica wetlands, the refuge constitutes one of the few remaining natural, undeveloped coastal areas of southern California today. Volunteer support by the Sierra Club, the El Dorado Chapter of the Audubon Society, the Bolsa Chica Conservancy assist the Station and the Fish and Wildlife service manage the refuge environment through annual trash cleanups and bird-counts.
The Naval Weapons Seal Beach Restoration Advisory Board held its first meeting in January 1995.