Perform like a champion out there, shipmate
April 2nd, 2010 | Life at Sea | Posted by Phil Ewing
Colin Kelly / Staff
ABOARD THE INDEPENDENCE — This ship has no decoration or personal touches in its crew’s mess, wardroom or goat locker. No signed proclamation from the mayor of Mobile, Ala., declaring Jan. 16 “USS Independence Day;” no rivet in a glass case from the previous Independence; no wooden ship’s wheel — none of the accouterments you usually see on the bulkheads of warships. Crew members say they’ll add all that stuff during the ship’s yard availability this summer in Norfolk, Va.
About the only thing on display now is this sign, on an overhang above a staircase leading down to the main deck, inspired by Notre Dame’s famous “Play Like a Champion Today” locker room sign. One of the chiefs thought sailors might like to slap the sign as they came down the stairs. We didn’t see any sailors doing that, but I found it to be pretty motivational.
Comments
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Glocke Says:
April 2nd, 2010 at 11:42 pmJPJ, America’s first fighting Captain, his statement was to keep the French Navy from sailing with him!
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sid Says:
April 5th, 2010 at 5:13 amThis paper featured an article which touted the ability of the LCS to stay OUT of Harm’s Way.
The ASW package’s big-picture goal, sailors say, is to “unman the front lines.”
“It keeps the fight far from the ship. It keeps sailors out of harm’s way,” said STG1 Blair Ransom, 31.
Oh yeah. Those wunder systems are nowhere near ready for prime time.
Yet more evidence of the muddled nature of the entire concept.
And I would bet that JPJ would scoff at a ship built to go so needlessly fast that its ability to take a hit in a fight was knowingly sacrificed.
Neither the Lockheed ship, a steel monohull design, nor a competing aluminum-hulled trimaran design built by General Dynamics Corp, was expected to “be survivable in a hostile combat environment,” said the report prepared by the Pentagon’s director of Operational Test and Evaluation…
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The Scoop Deck – LCS 2 returns Says:
August 30th, 2010 at 12:27 pm[...] the enormous overhead crane in its cavernous mission bay? Can it open its huge stern doors? Do its formerly spartan living spaces now have those touches of home — a plaque from the city of Independence, Mo.; some silver [...]