A vessel for a voyage to the other side
October 11th, 2010 | Historical | Posted by Phil Ewing
South Dakota veteran Earl Wehner displayed his wooden model of his old ship. // Linda Sailer / The Dickinson Press via AP
Anyone with memories of childhood model-making — and I don’t mind saying that the MiG 29 kit I built in sixth grade was the greatest achievement in aeronautical engineering up to that time — will feel like a piker compared to 82 year-old hobbyist Earl Wehner of Dickinson, S.D. With nothing more than a “small plastic toy, a photograph and his memory,” Wehner has built a giant oak model of the battleship South Dakota from scratch, by hand.
But this thing isn’t just for swimming pool playtime, reports Linda Sailer of The Dickinson Press — it’s going to be an actual vessel, as it were, for Wehner and his wife, Winnie:
“Tell her what it’s for,” said Winnie [referring to Sailer]. “It’s a casket for us and for Kayla,” the Wehners’ pet dog.
“It’s for our ashes,” added Earl, pointing out the three wooden boxes imbedded inside the battleship and secured by a latched door. “I kind of thought it up and we agreed on it, didn’t we, mother?” The battleship will be a fitting resting place for Earl and his wife, since it played such an important part of their lives.
WHOOOOOM!! That sweet human-interest story took a pretty gruesome turn pretty fast! But once the shock wears off, you realize: If you needed to pick someplace to spend eternity, it’s pretty tough to beat your very own battleship.
‘Once thing is certain: We can’t ignore them’
October 8th, 2010 | Foreign navies Video | Posted by Phil Ewing
Forget about all this modern-day Navy news — let’s take a trip back to the bad good old days, when American ships were tangling with Soviet ships all over the world, and you, as a naval person, needed a brief on just what we were up against. This is “Soviet Sea Power Today,” another classic from Periscope Films, and here’s part 2 and part 3.
The end of British seapower, cont’d.
October 8th, 2010 | Royal Navy | Posted by Phil Ewing
Could the entire Royal Navy shrink to a force smaller than the U.S. Navy’s ship-population of Norfolk, Va.? That’s the warning coming this week from New Austerity Britain, where the navy brass has offered to “mortgage everything” in order to save its beloved pair of Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers: The Royal Navy fleet could consist of about 25 ships, with “frigates, destroyers, submarines, minesweepers and all amphibious craft scrapped,” according to The Telegraph.
Shipbuilding expert Tim Colton writes that the fate of the Royal Navy doesn’t necessarily “pain” him per se, but that it could portend many problems for the U.S. Navy: “Where are we headed?” he wrote. “I still don’t hear any rational discussion of the problem. Listen, guys, we can have a lot of cheap ships, or a very few very expensive ships, or something in between. What we cannot have is a lot of very expensive ships. For crying out loud, let’s decide what we’re going to do and then get on with doing it, as efficiently as possible. Don’t we owe that to the taxpayers?”
Photo: The Royal Navy’s second Type 45 destroyer, Dauntless, showed off its nimble footwork during sea trials. Special note: The ship’s website identifies Dauntless as the fifth ship to bear the name, or “the sixth if you include the HMS Dauntless featured in The Pirates of the Caribbean – The Curse of the Black Pearl.” UPDATE: Coincidentally, the famous Beeb has a brand-new slideshow about Dauntless this morning.
Monks, arriving — and blessing
October 7th, 2010 | Carriers Photos | Posted by Phil Ewing
Here's a sea story for you: Djoo ever hear the one about the group of Buddhist monks that came on board the aircraft carrier? // MC3 David Cox / Navy
When you think “Buddhist monk,” your first mental picture probably isn’t of someone who’d be into persistent, credible, sustained combat power from the sea delivered by 4.5 acres of sovereign U.S. real estate anywhere in the world without a permission slip. And yet, by all appearances, the monks who came aboard the carrier George Washington this week not only don’t object, they apparently gave the ship their monkly stamp of approval.
GW is on one of those classic Western Pacific port visits in Thailand, and the ship hosted a contingent of monks from the Wat Jitapawan Temple on Wednesday. The monks got a tour of the ship and one of them even blessed the bridge overhead and the captain’s chair. Don’t scoff: When you’re sailing around WestPac with your every waking minute in the cross hairs of the Unstoppable Chinese Anti-Ship Insta-Death Missile, you need every last bit of luck you can get.
A visiting monk conducted blessing operations aboard the bridge of the George Washington. // MC3 David Cox / Navy
You’ve come a long way, female service members
October 7th, 2010 | leadership Washington | Posted by Phil Ewing
CNN's Kyra Phillips hosted top military commanders this week at a women's power forum in Washington. // Lt. Laura Stegherr / Navy
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Gen. Ann Dunwoody, commanding general of Army Materiel Command; and National Defense University president Vice Adm. Ann Rondeau all appeared with CNN anchor Kyra Phillips this week in Washington to talk about the advances that women have made in the military services. For example, Dunwoody proved that men no longer hold a monopoly on the ability to speak in jargon, buzzwords and Pentagon techno-phrases:
“We are in an asymmetrical environment without front and rear boundaries,” Dunwoody said of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. “Every soldier is in danger. What’s so good about the military is that we continue review those [policies]. The doors continue to open, and policies continue to change to capture the talent of men and women in uniform. All in battle are making sacrifices, and we can never forget that.”
Dunwoody’s answer clearly shows that she has reviewed today’s DoD lexicon from soup to nuts, gotten input from key stakeholders, and moved forward to make a commitment to leverage her resources to achieve broad-spectrum mastery of the full range of idea-delivery tactics, techniques and procedures, in keeping with today’s best practices. And she proves you don’t need to be a man for that.
Report: Simpson barfed in Truman visit
October 6th, 2010 | Carriers Life at Sea | Posted by Phil Ewing
Did the Navy's famous hearty meat sauce cause newly converted vegan Jessica Simpson to vomit during her visit to the Harry S. Truman? // MCSN Ryan McLearnon / Navy
This weird story just got weirder: Acne treatment spokeswoman Jessica Simpson only performed one song during her visit to the carrier Harry S. Truman, celebrity magazine Us Weekly reports, because she had to stop and throw up after eating on the mess decks with sailors.
Potential causes include questionable choices from before her visit, the spaghetti and garlic bread she had for lunch, or the heat in the hangar bay. Reported Us:
“She flew in on a helicopter and had three Red Bulls with no water,” a source tells the new Us Weekly of her Oct. 1 visit to the Persian Gulf. “Then she complained it was too hot out.” … From there, things got messy. After eating, the singer, 30, attempted to perform. “She only sang one song, then vomited,” says the insider. Still, a source close to Simpson adds, “She was dehydrated and got sick before she performed — and even got an IV. The doctor told her not to sing, but she did anyway.”
Considerations: It’s not clear if Simpson finished her song, excused herself and then ralphed over the side, or she was in mid-flourish when the fireworks started. (Then again, we probably would’ve heard more about this — and seen the inevitable video — if that happened.) It’s also not clear from this undoubtedly well-sourced Us report whether Simpson barfed before and after her song, or she only engaged in barfing operations once, and people are unclear about where it fell into the chronology.
Navy Times’s laser-sharp news editor Jenn Rafael, who is a vegetarian, also points out that, according to other reports, Simpson has recently gone vegan, and so her stomach may well have been overpowered by the ship’s hearty Navy chow.
UPDATE: Still another report says Simpson complained of “seasickness” and went to Truman’s sick bay before her performance, which the crew enjoyed even though the show was “a bust.” They must’ve had some monster seas, as one reader points out, to rock the ship that much…
The flag officer billet even SecNav couldn’t create
October 6th, 2010 | leadership | Posted by Phil Ewing
Wherever he goes, whether making speeches on beautiful Treasure Island, or meeting with high-powered Belgian defense officials, Navy Secretary Ray Mabus doesn’t mind letting people know that he comes from a place called Mississippi. In fact, one of the colleges he’s attended also is located there, a school called “Old Mississippi,” which he also is not above mentioning to people. But even Mabus, with his 900,000 active-duty and civilian Navy Department employees, and his $170 billion budget, couldn’t get the outcome he supported in the latest major controversy at his alma mater.
Ole Miss officials and students have evidently rejected the idea of making Rebel Alliance fleet commander Adm. Ackbar the school’s new mascot — they’ve narrowed it down to three baffling choices, none of which has anything to do with any of the Star Wars movies, for some reason. (Even the terrible prequels.) But Mabus was on Team Ackbar, his spokeswoman told Scoop Deck earlier this year, and no wonder: As Navy secretary, Ackbar might’ve ultimately reported to him.
A look inside the secret ship
October 6th, 2010 | Science and technology Ships | Posted by Phil Ewing
Legendary sea-scribes Faram and Cavas were aboard Sea Fighter for part of its time underway this week. // John Williams / Navy
Who knows what mysteries lie inside the aluminum skin of the Navy’s one-of-a-kind, experimental catamaran, the Sea Fighter? Who can say what kind of advanced, high-speed equipment they’ve got on that thing, or what undocumented capabilities are built into the ship?
Soon, you will. Our senior colleagues Mark D. Faram and Christopher P. Cavas — what a team… those two are their own Murderer’s Row! — got to go aboard the Sea Fighter off Florida this week, and soon you’ll be able to see their stories and even video reports on Navy Times and Defense News.
A surreal day at sea
October 5th, 2010 | Carriers Life at Sea | Posted by Phil Ewing
Direct-to-DVD movie star Jessica Simpson chose a questionable outfit for her live-fire test of the .50 caliber machine guns aboard the carrier Harry S. Truman. // MCSN Tyler Caswell / Navy
All right: You’re a sailor aboard a mighty 95,000-ton nuclear-powered warship in the dangerous waters of the Middle East, launching and recovering jets flying combat missions over Afghanistan. Then “Private Valentine” star Jessica Simpson shows up, with her blinding Chiclet teeth and her is-she-really-all-dumb-or-is-that-an-act routine, and what does everyone start doing? Singing Christmas music, of course.
One hopes the crew of the carrier Harry S. Truman was ready for that jelly, as it were, because all these dynamics have made this head spin here in the Cubicle of Excellence. Not only was Simpson aboard for a standard USO “you’re doin’ a great job” visit, she auditioned sailors in the 90-degree hangar bay who wanted to appear on her new Christmas album. They had to sing “I’ll Be Home For Christmas,” and one of them — AB3 John Britt — is not only going to be on Simpson’s record, he’s going to be singing with her at the lighting of the Christmas tree in New York’s Rockefeller Center.
“It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and I’m honored to be part of it,” Britt said in the Navy’s announcement. “I’m excited to be able to represent Truman, as well as the entire Navy. My family and shipmates are proud of me, and I couldn’t ask for anything better.”
Simpson also signed autographs, ate spaghetti and did some singing of her own.
The cyber-troops of tomorrow
October 4th, 2010 | Personnel Science and technology | Posted by Phil Ewing
A new cadre of Navy "cyber warrants" could be for computer-warfare what pilots such as Chief Warrant Officer 2 Fredrick Torres, seen here with his UH 60, are for Army aviation. // Sgt. Beth Gorenc / Army
Here’s a challenge for today’s high-tech, super-joint Navy: How do you attract a cadre of — let’s be honest here — nerdy, perhaps less-martial computer experts that will stick around to pay back the time and money required to train them in the arcane cyber-disciplines that none of us understand? A 1980s-style movie montage immediately springs to mind: Glasses ground under boot heels at Recruit Training Command; graphing calculators used as fodder for games of keep-away; shaved heads dunked into toilet bowls in special rigged-for-sea, high-reg swirlies…. and so on.
The top brass has evidently had these same visions, which is why 10th Fleet commander Vice Adm. Barry McCullough told House lawmakers not long ago that the Navy is developing new cyber-specific career fields, including what he called “cyber warrants” and “cyber engineers.” Not many details yet on what that actually means, but the idea seems to be that a cyber warrant, for example, could spend a career like many Army aviators, who get to fly their beloved helicopters safe from being promoted to a desk job, or staff assignment, or the other parts of a career that take you outside your area of specialization.
Moreover, these cyber-warrants might have duty that didn’t look much like ordinary Navy service: Hanging out up at Fort Meade, Md., or at other shore installations that serve as major network nodes, and potentially going to sea much less often than Joe or Jane Deckplate. In fact, could this present a way for the Navy to entice people already in the force today to lat-move into the cyber world? That might be a quick way to solve part of the cadre-building problem… Would you do it?