The miracle of cell phones
February 23rd, 2010 | Coast Guard | Posted by Susan Schept
Coast Guard Health Services Technican 2nd Class Jeremiah Romankowski, attached to the Port Security Unit 311, administers first aid Feb. 14 to people in Leogane. // PA2 Thomas M. Blue / Coast Guard
A resourceful Coast Guard volunteer has been using social media and cell phone text messages to help rescuers find Haitians who are trapped or have been missed by food and water distributions, according to The New York Times. Ryan Bank has worked with the State Department, the Pentagon, aid groups and Haiti’s leading cell phone carrier, among other entities, to get help to Haitians.
Although cell phones calls could not get connected, text messages were easier because they used less bandwidth. Kudos to clever thinking. Bank has received more than 18,000 messages.
Report: No more nuke Tomahawks after all
February 22nd, 2010 | nuclear weapons Submarines Washington | Posted by Phil Ewing
STS1 Joseph Halikman inspected a training Tomahawk aboard the fast attack sub Newport News. The nuclear versions, already withdrawn from the fleet, are going away completely, according to a report. // EM2 Xander Gamble / Navy
Japan’s Kyodo News Service is reporting that the U.S. has “informally” notified the government of Japan that it’s going to retire the nuclear-capable variant of the Tomahawk cruise missile, “in line with President Barack Obama’s policy to pursue a world free of nuclear weapons, Japanese government sources said Monday.”
As we discussed back in December, this move won’t take much. According to the Pentagon’s nuke-programs report, the Navy — which is responsible for the U.S. nuke-Tomahawk arsenal — decided on its own initiative not to maintain the TLAM-Ns, because it decided on its own it didn’t want them anymore.
Our phriend Ol’ Phib, however, whence came this story, sees a downside:
TLAM-N has certain advantages over a [submarine launched ballistic missile] when it comes to not scaring the vodka out of our Russian friends when you launch it – in addition to other things that the crazy people behind the cypher door can talk to you about.
How about you? Does a world without nuke Tomahawks make you want to break out in a round of Kumbaya, or should the U.S. keep the ball peen hammer next to the sledge in its strategic toolkit?
InSurv on a big deck: Let the good times roll
February 22nd, 2010 | Life at Sea Morale Ships The Pacific | Posted by Phil Ewing
The amphibious assault ship Peleliu completed an inspection by the Board of Inspection and Survey earlier this month // MC2 Dustin Kelling / Navy
The crew of the amphibious assault ship Peleliu got a special early Valentine this year: A visit from the Board of Inspection and Survey!
Peleliu — aka “The Iron Nickel,” given that it’s LHA 5 — got to host the Navy’s favorite guests at the beginning of the month, according to this announcement, and one of the areas reportedly not marked “unsat” was the ship’s spirit:
Pride in the ship was not one of Peleliu’s shortcomings.
“This week was especially challenging, but I am very proud of our ability to overcome adversity,” said commanding officer Capt. David A. Schnell. “The weeks leading up to, and including the week of, INSURV, this crew poured its heart into making sure we were as ready as possible.”
Still, when you’re talking about an inspection aboard a 30-year old gator, as the Navy’s story points out, you’re probably going to encounter a few technical issues:
“We are directing our efforts to correct a number of discrepancies identified, whether they’re material or administrative,” said [ship's training officer Lt. Cmdr. Robert] Bulatao. “That’s where a lot of our focus has gone as we finished INSURV and approach deployment.”
So what did the InSurv board write about Peleliu after their visit this month? Good question. Even though InSurv reports were public documents for decades, available under the Freedom of Information Act even throughout the height of the Cold War, last year they became classified.
The good eats Navy
February 22nd, 2010 | Chow Life at Sea The deckplates | Posted by Phil Ewing
CSSN Alvic Dedios put dinner together in November aboard the dock landing ship Tortuga, which won an award from NavSup for having the best mess and chow in the "medium afloat" category. // MC1 Geronimo Aquino / Navy
The question of which commands in the Navy have the best galleys and the best chow has been answered for another year: Navy Secretary Ray Mabus has announced the latest winners of the Ney Awards, brought to you by Naval Supply Systems Command, which you can view here.
LCS 3 mods may preclude need for water wings
February 19th, 2010 | Science and technology Ships | Posted by Phil Ewing
The littoral combat ship Fort Worth, now under construction in Marinette, Wis., could be modified in the yard to preclude its need for external "buoyancy tanks." // Lockheed Martin
Remember those boxy structures — the “buoyancy tanks,” or as we called them, water wings — the Navy attached to the stern of the littoral combat ship Freedom? They may just be a one-ship answer to insufficient LCS floatiness, Scoop Deck has learned.
Kim Martinez, a spokeswoman for Freedom-class LCS builder Lockheed Martin, said Friday that LockMart’s next ship, the Fort Worth, “is being assessed to preclude the same tank design,” and depending on that study, could get some modification while it’s being built to obviate the need for its own pair of water wings.
Neither LockMart nor the Navy will say the original LCS 1 design included too little reserve buoyancy, but Martinez stressed that Freedom “meets all the Navy’s requirements, including for reserve buoyancy.” So does that mean the Navy discovered problems with its own requirements after accepting delivery of the Freedom?
“That’s a question best answered by the Navy,” Martinez said.
Fade out
February 19th, 2010 | Books Royal Navy | Posted by Phil Ewing
The destroyer Daring sailed into the sunset on a training exercise off Portsmouth // Royal Navy
The plight of the Royal Navy today has been building for a very long time, according to a recent book that recounts the story of the modern service from 1957 until now.
Iran’s new destroyer that isn’t
February 19th, 2010 | Foreign navies Ships The Middle East | Posted by Phil Ewing
Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, toured the new self-styled "destroyer" this week // Press TV
Lots of chatter online today about Iran’s new domestically built “destroyer,” as reports are calling it, keyed off a top item on Iran’s state-run, English language Press TV news site. The official story describes the new vessel, Jamaran, as a “guided missile destroyer,” armed with “a variety of anti-ship and surface-to-air missiles,” as well as “torpedoes and modern naval cannons.”
That sure sounds like a DDG, until you realize you’re talking about a ship of about 1,400 tons, copied from Iran’s existing Vosper-built, mid-60s vintage Alvand-class frigates. (You can read a lot about them and their role in Operation Praying Mantis — speaking of “operations” — at this site by Scoop Deck’s senior colleague Brad Penniston.)
To be sure, ship classifications these days are awfully wishy-washy — only in the U.S. Navy would an Arleigh Burke-class warship carrying 90 or more missiles be a “destroyer,” rather than a battleship — but doesn’t it seem a little far-fetched to style a 1,400-ton modified frigate as a “DDG?” It’s smaller — although, some might argue, more heavily armed — than a littoral combat ship.
Another senior colleague, Defense News naval correspondent Christopher P. Cavas, thought so:
“It’s a glorified corvette,” he said. “That’s a light frigate, at best. But in their navy, since they don’t have anything else, it’s a destroyer, so it must be really powerful. Colombia would put it on drug interdiction duties.”
“Operation New Dawn:” Thoughts?
February 19th, 2010 | Life at Sea Shore duty The deckplates The Middle East | Posted by Phil Ewing
The U.S. mission in Iraq is no longer about that country's eponymous freedom, but the start of a new day. What do you make of the change? // MC3 Daniel Barker / Navy
If you’re heading out to the sandbox as an individual augmentee, or your ship is going to be up in the Persian Gulf supporting operations in Iraq, you’ve got to get in as many references as you can to “Operation Iraqi Freedom,” because that’s going away. Oh-Eye-Eff, as we colloquially say, will become Oh-Enn-Dee — “Operation New Dawn,” effective Sept. 1.
This change, announced Thursday, has prompted many discussions here at the Center of Excellence about good and bad names for operations throughout history. Sometimes an operation can be good — as in the Navy’s response to the disaster in Haiti — but the name (“Operation United Response“) … meh. Sometimes a mission can be awesome, as in the Allied invasion of Europe, and its name — Operation Overlord — can be the last perfect touch that really makes it sing.
Wikipedia has a pretty comprehensive list of operation names over the years. What are your favorites? And what do you think of “New Dawn?”
Falklands War 2 on the horizon? Nah. Well… nah.
February 19th, 2010 | Historical Maritime operations Royal Navy | Posted by Phil Ewing
The Royal Navy destroyer Sheffield burned after being hit by an Argentine anti-ship missile during the Falklands War, which, despite recent tensions, seems unlikely to get a second installment // Royal Navy
Great Britain and Argentina are in another tiff these days, centering — again — on the U.K.’s tiny island possessions in the South Atlantic. The British (and everyone else) call them the Falklands; the Argentines call them las Malvinas. The last time these two nations got into a big tiff over the islands, 28 years ago, it escalated into a shooting war, but there’s not much worry about that this time. Or is there?
Just as when Argentina invaded the Falklands the first time, in 1982, the ruling government in the U.K. is unpopular, mired in economic turmoil and on the verge of making more steep cuts to its military — especially the Royal Navy. There have even been discussions in London of collapsing all the British armed forces into one mutant super-service. You could make the argument that the U.K. was no more prepared to fight its first Falklands War than it would be for a second round.
However, this column in the Daily Mail, by the man who commanded the Royal Navy’s amphibious group back in the day, shoots that right down:
So as as the sound of political sabre rattling returns to the South Atlantic, could we repeat that success today? I’m not doubting the resolve of our armed forces – our soldiers, sailors and airmen have a long and proud track record of plucking success from adversity – but I’m sorry to say that we no longer have the ships and equipment to launch a sea-borne attack on an enemy on the other side of the world… If the Royal Naval fleet has shrunk spectacularly since 1982 – it had 55 frigates and destroyers then; today it has 24 – then the British merchant fleet has all but disappeared. Who knows where we’d get the ships to support a war in the South Atlantic from now.
From the U.S. Navy, perhaps? President Reagan didn’t get too openly involved in FWI, but as Adm. Sandy Woodward wrote in his memoir “100 Days,” the British Harrier pilots over the Falklands couldn’t have been as successful as they were without American-built AIM-9 Sidewinder missiles. If the U.K. and Argentina decided to throw down again, who knows what kind of help the U.S. might provide — or withhold.
How they saved a hero boat
February 18th, 2010 | Coast Guard Historical Maritime operations Ships | Posted by Phil Ewing
The Coast Guard's legendary motor lifeboat 36500 has been restored to its former luster by preservationists in Massachusetts. // David Liscio / Orleans Historical Society
Scoop Deck got a copy of February’s WoodenBoat magazine for Valentine’s Day this year (from a Valentine who, mercifully, tolerates the idiosyncrasies of a ship addict) but didn’t get a chance to give it a close read until today’s flight back from Jacksonville. In addition to some engaging write-ups and many illustrations of beautiful craft that Scoop Deck could never afford in ten lifetimes, the magazine has a great feature about a legendary Coast Guard motor lifeboat that has been restored to its former glory up in Massachusetts.
Motor lifeboat 36500 and its crew rescued 32 of 33 men adrift aboard the wrecked stern section of the tanker Pendleton 58 years ago today in an epic operation that has become a Coast Guard legend. The boat took aboard all those survivors despite having a maximum rated capacity of 12 people, creating a constant risk of being swamped or overturned. But even though 36500 saved the day, it was left to rot and ruin after being decommissioned in 1968.
That was until a group of enthusiasts got it added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2003, and began the work of restoring the wood-and-canvas lifeboat to its original luster. You can find out much more about the boat and the restoration online here, and you can understand why, for as pretty as wooden craft are, they’re also a lot of work.