Stand by for LPD 21 mania
October 30th, 2009 | Morale Ships | Posted by Phil Ewing
The amphibious transport dock New York will be the belle of the media world in the week leading up to commissioning in Manhattan on Nov. 7 // MC1 Shawn Graham
Navy-types, get ready to be blasted with an information fire hose. The amphibious transport dock New York has pulled away from Naval Station Norfolk, Va., bound for its namesake city and a week’s worth of frenzied attention in the media capital of the world before its commissioning Nov. 7.
The end of the JATO era
October 29th, 2009 | Aviation Morale Navy The greenside Video | Posted by Phil Ewing
The Blue Angels' beloved Marine-crewed C-130T, "Fat Albert," will do its last jet-assisted takeoff Nov. 14, to the dismay of males everywhere // Navy
A seldom-discussed but important rite of passage for every American boy is the first time he hears the story of “the JATO car,” the infamous station wagon whose owner augmented it with Jet Assisted Take Off rocket bottles. The cops found the wreckage of his car crashed into the side of a mountain, the story goes, clear evidence of a man who sacrificed his life to absurd speed-demonism. You can do insane, dangerous, awesome things in this world, the boy learns.
The rite is completed when that boy, perhaps by then a man, learns the story isn’t true. It never happened. And the chances it could ever happen are dwindling, because the world is running out of JATO rockets, according to this story by Scoop Deck shipmate Amy McCullough of Marine Corps Times. One of the last U.S. aircraft to regularly execute jet-assisted takeoffs — the Blue Angels’ beloved, Marine-crewed C-130T “Fat Albert” — will do its last one next month. The end of the “JATO car” legend can’t be far behind. Wrote McCullough:
“Everyone in the Fat Albert shop is really sad,” said Maj. Drew Hess, the Blue Angels’ senior C-130 pilot. “It is a significant chapter [in the team’s history] that unfortunately is being closed.”
To execute a JATO, Fat Albert uses eight solid-fuel rocket bottles, which supply enough momentum for the aircraft to leave the runway after traveling just 1,500 feet. Climbing at a 45-degree angle, it can reach 1,000 feet in just 15 seconds.
The [one-time use] fuel bottles, which weigh about 150 pounds when full, were designed to thrust C-130s skyward in austere conditions where traditional runways are unavailable, said 1st Lt. Craig Thomas, a Marine spokesman at the Pentagon. But the Corps hasn’t used JATO in combat since the Vietnam War, he said, and it’s unlikely to do so again, as newer KC-130Js have engines built to exert the same thrust as C-130Ts outfitted with rocket bottles.
Cruel, inescapable progress. Kind of like growing up.
Check out this motivational video of Fat Albert doing its thing:
America’s first supercarrier museum ship?
October 29th, 2009 | Aviation Carriers Historical | Posted by Phil Ewing
The decommissioned carrier Ranger, seen here at sea in its glory days, could become a museum ship in Portland, Ore. // Naval History and Heritage Command
World War II carrier museums are all well and good, but for five decades naval aviation has been about the supercarrier — the big, angled deck, steam catapult-equipped monsters whose era began with the commissioning of the Forrestal in 1955. (Earlier flattops were retrofitted with steam cats. ) But even though many of those big ships are out of the fleet, your Cub Scout pack can’t do a sleep-over on one. Yet.
However, Portland, Ore.-area scouts and other propeller-heads can take heart about the news Thursday that the USS Ranger Foundation cleared the first of four hurdles with Naval Sea Systems Command to bring the decommissioned carrier Ranger to a berth on the Willamette River. It’s no small undertaking: The group still must raise money, find a suitable spot, tow the ship from Bremerton, Wash., and get it safe and set up to accept visitors and exhibits.
Getting and running a museum ship is really tough. Navy Times has reported on case after case — such as with the carrier John F. Kennedy — in which organizations’ vision far exceeded their ability to raise money or make the necessary deals. Still, if you have a waterfront somewhere you’d like to spruce it up with some haze-gray decoration, here’s NavSea’s list of ships available to become museums, including the famous Sea Shadow, the cruiser Ticonderoga (pdf) and even another supercarrier, the Saratoga. (pdf)
With the Ranger news peg, this Vietnam-era image of the Ranger and Task Force 77 is too good not to display:
Naval History and Heritage Command
Mids at the World Series. Too bad Army’s not playing
October 29th, 2009 | Naval Academy Sports | Posted by Phil Ewing
The Naval Academy color guard, here presenting the colors in 2005 in Philadelphia, will do its thing at game two of the World Series tonight in New York // JO1 James Pinsky/ Navy
Halloween is this weekend, the skies are turning iron and giant flocks of migrating birds are doing touch-and-goes outside on the Parking Lot of Excellence. In short, autumn is hitting its stride, and yet thanks to the greed generosity of America’s TV networks, baseball season still hasn’t ended. Wednesday night was game one of the World Series, which saw two great Cleveland pitchers taking on hitters from New York and Philadelphia, and for game two Thursday, the Navy is getting into the act.
The Naval Academy’s color guard will present the colors at Yankee Stadium before the opening pitch, the academy announced Thursday morning, although it wasn’t clear whether that would be part of the televised broadcast. Just in case you can’t catch them on TV, the midshipmen who’ll be taking part are:
Midshipman 1st Class Dan Sauer of Kirkland, Wash., carrying the Brigade of Midshipmen flag; Midshipman 1st Class Luke Leveque of Kodiak, Alaska, carrying the flag of the United States Marine Corps; Midshipman 1st Class Jason Mazzoni of Salisbury, N.C., carrying the flag of the United States Navy; Midshipman 2nd Class Bryen Roder of Little Falls, N.J; and riflemen Midshipmen 2nd Class Zishan Hameed of Norfolk, Va.; and 2nd Class Hannah Allaire of San Antonio, Texas.
Collision at sea: Aftermath
October 28th, 2009 | Foreign navies Life at Sea Mishaps Ships merchant ships | Posted by Phil Ewing
Firefighters worked to put out the fire in the bow of the Japanese destroyer Kurama, which burned after a collision with a South Korean container ship // AP
The photos appearing from Japan this week are enough to unnerve any seafarer — a destroyer’s bow crunched, burned, gone after its collision with a freighter at sea. Six Japanese sailors aboard the destroyer Kurama were hurt in the accident, but no one aboard the South Korean container ship Carina Star was injured. The latest theory is that the Carina Star veered in front of the Kurama to avoid a third ship in the channel, although the final verdict likely won’t be in for weeks.
Even more galling for the Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force, the Kurama was on its way to serve as the flagship for a triennial fleet review this weekend.
Here’s what the ship looked like in happier times:
MC3 Daniel Viramontes/ Navy
Vectors. Found, and lost.
October 27th, 2009 | Personnel Science and technology Submarines | Posted by Andrew Scutro
Some things are just motivating, like the last few words of the Star Spangled Banner, sacks of cash, hot steak sandwiches and of course, the Five Vector Model. The Scoop Deck staff is on an eternal search for reliable sightings of the Five Vector Model and yes, we found another one, pictured above. It was in Groton. Here is one example we keep in the archive, a sighting from the Navy’s Birthday in 2006, somewhere in the Pacific. If you see a 5VM, in any form, please send in a photo. Probably the most prized example would be a “5VM” vanity license plate. Or a tattoo. That would be sweet.
Fun Fact for the kids: note the difference in vector type and amount between the above example from Groton and the one from the Essex in 2006.
Help Team Navy sink the online competition
October 27th, 2009 | Blogs Science and technology | Posted by Phil Ewing
Team Navy bloggers need your help to raise the most money in this year's Project Valour-IT campaign // Navy
The big guns in the Navy blogosphere don’t always agree — Bring back the battleships? Chinese carrier threat? Anything about LCS? — but starting this week they’re steaming line astern in a dread task force with a common objective: Raise money for a great cause and defeat the blogger teams representing the lesser other services.
Galrahn, Maggie, ol’ Phib and Steeljaw are just some of the boldface names on Team Navy taking part in this year’s Project Valour-IT fund drive, which goes toward buying voice-controlled laptops and other needed gear for our fighting men and women who are recovering from injuries they’ve received in action. Here’s the full blog roster for Team Navy, and if you kick them a few bucks you’ll help push the Navy fund-raising bar past the other teams’.
As of Tuesday morning, the Marine Corps team was in the lead — and that’s not acceptable, shipmate!
New ovens take the work out of chow at sea
October 27th, 2009 | Carriers Chow Life at Sea Science and technology The deckplates | Posted by Phil Ewing
In the future, CS3 Jermaine Thompson, of the carrier Enterprise, could need to only push a button and his oven would know exactly how long to bake this bread // Navy
The Navy operates some of the most advanced equipment on the planet, what with all the fighter jets and nuclear reactors and Aegis radars and such, but less so in the galley, where culinary specialists depend as much on their own skill as new technology. That’s changing, though — sailors aboard the carrier Abraham Lincoln are testing three new high-speed ovens that can basically cook meals on their own, and which promise to make work much simpler for the CSes of tomorrow.
The Blodgett Hydrovection, Rational Combi, and Alto Shaam Combi-therm all can be programmed with the Navy’s standard menu items, which means that sailors can prepare entrees the way the rest of us push the “popcorn” button on the microwave:
“Now the culinary specialist doesn’t have to read off the card and set everything accordingly. It’s as simple as pressing a few buttons,” said Culinary Specialist 1st Class Eric Russell…
For example, the menu card for beef roast rib says to roast the meat for three to four hours at 300 degrees Fahrenheit. Since the oven knows this, the CS just has to look under the beef section for roast rib and the oven knows the exact temperature and time left to cook.
In cases like beef rib roast where the menu card instructs the CS to insert a thermometer and roast until it reaches a certain temperature in the center, the new oven has another convenient feature. There is a sensor the CS can insert in the meat so the oven can keep track of the temperature itself. It knows that according to the menu card, beef rib roast must be roasted until the center is at least 140 degrees Fahrenheit. So it adjusts the remaining time according to the temperature of the meat.
It’s the galley practices of tomorrow — today! If your ship makes a lot of special requests for chow, these new ovens eventually will include the ability for local cooks to program them, according to this story.
The world wonders
October 26th, 2009 | Blogs Historical Life at Sea Maritime operations Ships | Posted by Phil Ewing
The Japanese battleship Yamato burned after being struck by U.S. Navy aircraft during the Battle of Leyte Gulf, which ended 65 years ago today // Naval History and Heritage Command
Monday marks the 65th anniversary of the end of the Battle of Leyte Gulf — the largest sea battle in history and one of Scoop Deck’s all-time favorites — and it wouldn’t do for the date to pass without taking note.
The Battle of Leyte Gulf includes some of the finest — and worst — moments in naval history, including the last surface engagement between battleships; the spectacular heroism of the destroyers Johnston and Samuel B. Roberts; and Adm. William Halsey’s fateful decision to send his carriers after a Japanese feint.
Suitably, the Web is awash in good links about the battle and its participants, including Eagle1’s account of the battle, Maggie’s links and SteelJaw’s history lesson. And the Wiki on this particular topic is pleasantly bright and comprehensive.
Stranded on a sub in the Chesapeake Bay (updated)
October 26th, 2009 | Life at Sea Maritime operations Naval Academy Submarines | Posted by Phil Ewing
Visitors spent a sunny afternoon stranded topside on the fast attack sub Annapolis when the Navy's boats to ferry them to shore broke down // Lt. Patrick Evans/ Navy
ABOARD THE FAST ATTACK SUBMARINE ANNAPOLIS – After a pleasant but brief visit to this sleek black shark, lurking incongruously amid the sails gliding across the shimmering Chesapeake Bay, it was time to leave.
The Annapolis’ skipper, Capt. Mike Holland, said our launch would be arriving any moment — plus Scoop Deck had asked to see the ship’s Vertical Launch System tubes in the bow — so we climbed up the ladder forward of the conn and examined them for a few moments in the clear, but chilly, Maryland sunshine. It was just after 12:30. After several more minutes of conversation on the sub’s bow, our boat still hadn’t arrived.