Watch your step out there, sir
November 18th, 2009 | Foreign navies Life at Sea Maritime operations The Middle East | Posted by Phil Ewing
Climbing up or down a Jacob's ladder can be a tricky job, as when this Mexican sailor boarded a German warship this spring during an exercise // Coast Guard
Quick sea anecdote: One time Scoop Deck was standing in the upper vehicle stowage bay of the amphibious assault ship Makin Island, at sea in the Gulf of Mexico, waiting to climb down a Jacob’s ladder into a boat moored alongside. It was clear and sunny, but the sea was choppy enough that people were nervous about reporters not being able to get on the boat without taking a bath.
One chief boatswain’s mate counseled not to step down the ladder below the gunwale of the launch, because it would catch your leg and mangle it against the amphib’s hull. (”That’ll ruin your whole day,” he said.) But don’t step from the ladder to the launch when it’s at the peak of a wave, because as it starts to fall, he said, so will you. Scoop Deck stepped off at the peak, did a few semi-splits and cartwheels around the slippery deck, got covered with sea slime, but at least stayed aboard.
The presence of this story, hopefully, won’t make it sound too mean to point out these hilarious photographs of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who had some trouble climbing from an inflatable boat to a Jacob’s ladder this week. “Trouble,” as in, he fell into some poor sailor’s lap.
Netanyahu wanted to congratulate the crew of an Israeli warship for interdicting a load of weapons bound for Hezbollah, but from the looks of it, the sailors probably congratulated him for not swimming in the Mediterranean.
Have you ever acquitted yourself less than gracefully when climbing on or off a small boat?
A New Navy Term
November 16th, 2009 | Carriers Life at Sea Maritime operations Navy The deckplates | Posted by Andrew Tilghman
Looks like the Navy has coined a new term.
I heard it for the first time a couple of months ago when I was out on the Truman and talking to Rear Adm. Patrick Driscoll, the strike group’s commander. He was explaining how they would remain ready despite a six-month gap between the JTFX and an actual deployment.
Driscoll said the strike group would probably go out for another large-scale excersise.
“The Navy loves acronyms, so we’ll probably call it ’sustain-ex’ or something like that,” Driscoll said casually.
Looks like that term Driscoll was trying out has been formalized. A few days ago, the Navy public affairs office announced that the carrier John C. Stennis is heading out for a “sustainment excersize (SUSTAINEX).”
Add that to the next edition of the Dictionary of Naval Abreviations, or DICNAVAB.
Uuurr-auughh as the Marine Corps turns 234
November 10th, 2009 | Historical Life at Sea The greenside leadership | Posted by Phil Ewing
Today is the birthday of the United States Marine Corps, marking 234 years since the Continental Congress met at the famous Tun Tavern and approved a resolution calling for two battalions of hard-chargin’ soldiers of the sea to fight from Navy ships against the British. Since then, the Marines have graciously permitted the U.S. government to organize other military services, as well.
The Marine Corps birthday brought to mind a time in Iraq this summer, when Scoop Deck was touring a forward operating post called Camp Ubaydi, in northern Anbar Province, as part of the entourage following around Navy Secretary Ray Mabus and Marine Maj. Gen. Richard Tryon, the commanding general of Multinational Force-West.
Our CH-46 Sea Knights (escorted by a menacing AH-1 Cobra) had landed on an unimproved mud pad; the “chow hall” was a wooden box; and now Tryon was leading Mabus through one of the crowded barracks rooms, occupied by elements of the 2nd Battalion, 1st Marines. The leathernecks were standing at attention next to their racks and Mabus, ever the politician, needed a way to break the ice with them.
Another sound of freedom — or is it?
November 9th, 2009 | Blogs Historical Life at Sea | Posted by Phil Ewing
Seaman Sarah Rickett, of the USS Constitution, demonstrated how to load one of its cannons. Neighbors of the ship have complained its gun salutes are too loud // Navy
In Hampton Roads, Va., the punches and counter-punches over the noise of fighter jets from Naval Air Station Oceana eventually reached the point that people began putting stickers on their cars that read “I ♥ jet noise.” The earsplitting roar of jet engines is the “sound of freedom,” supporters said, and if you don’t like it — you can giiit out.
An even stranger Navy noise situation is in play up in Boston, where, according to the local paper, some of the finer elements of society are complaining about the regular cannon salutes and other “noise” put out by the USS Constitution. One example: “Over the summer, we have entertained several times, and we have had guests sit up in shock when the cannon goes off.”
Heavens! One scarcely dares dream of it! It simply won’t do to startle Ambassador Carstairs and Lady Uppington-Smythe as they try to enjoy their vichyssoise! And yet the Navy apparently plans to accede to none of the requests quoted by the Herald:
- A reduction in the size of the battery charge would help.
- In the morning, a reduction in the National Anthem volume would help.
- On Sat and Sun, would you be open to eliminating or delaying the morning salute to say 9am?
Just as quickly as the complaints materialized, the Constitution’s other neighbors and advocates have come to its defense. Some of them are quoted here, but two others are names that will be familiar to frequent visitors on the Deck — Boston Maggie isn’t named that because she’s from Peoria, and as a hometown girl, she’s going to bat for the Constitution. And although Mike Burleson makes his home in graceful Charleston, S.C., he too is on the side of the world’s oldest floating commissioned warship.
What do you think? Should Old Ironsides scale back or stop its cannon salutes to be a good neighbor?
Bored in Manhattan? Check out the Navy and Marines
November 4th, 2009 | Life at Sea Maritime operations Ships The greenside | Posted by Phil Ewing
Marine Capt. Anthony Scarcella showed a visitor the controls of his AH-1 Cobra aboard the New York this week. Many aircraft, vehicles and weapons are on display on board // MC1 Corey Lewis/ Navy
NEW YORK — Here’s an old story you’ve heard before: A hot new performer arrives in in this notoriously hard-to-please city and is rewarded with fame and adulation. Here’s the twist: This time the main character is a 25,000-ton Navy warship.
Canadian Navy: It’s Timmies or nothin’, eh?
November 4th, 2009 | Chow Foreign navies Life at Sea Morale | Posted by Phil Ewing
U.S. and Canadian airmen unloaded a mobile Tim Hortons from a C-17 at Kandahar Air Field, Afghanistan. Tim Hortons coffee fuels Canada's military in the same way that F76 and JP-5 fuel the U.S. Navy // Canadian Forces
Why do Canadians love Tim Hortons so much? Good question. Why do boatswain’s mates wear those funny hard hats? These are mysteries to which there may never be good answers, but their effects are quite plain — especially that first one. Canadians love their “Timmies,” as they call it, in the same way they love power plays and those French fries with that weird gravy on them. Well indeed does Scoop Deck remember spotting a Tim Hortons, dispensing piping hot coffee, on a 115-degree afternoon at Kandahar Air Field, Afghanistan.
The Canadian Forces needs its Timmies so bad that it has issued a solicitation for the coffee in Halifax by name. Starbucks, Peet’s, Gevalia — none need apply, the CBC reports:
“There shall be no acceptable substitute,” according to the tender issued Monday. “Tim Hortons has been determined by MARLANT” — the navy’s Maritime Forces Atlantic command — “as the product of choice based on expressed customer taste and preferences for boosting morale in Afghanistan, Sudan and Sierra Leone.”
You can’t get a much bigger endorsement than a nation’s military requesting your product to the exclusion of all those other hosers. Is there an equivalent coffee in the U.S. Navy? Or do you rely on command ingenuity to create a distinctive product — i.e. “boat coffee?”
H/T: Springbored (who praised the U.S. Navy’s decision to shed “fru-fru, gold-plated, 5th Generation stealth coffee.”)
Attention, vandals: Your Navy needs you
November 3rd, 2009 | Life at Sea Ships | Posted by Phil Ewing
About 100,000 people were expected to visit the amphibious transport dock New York during its visit this week, leading up to its commissioning Saturday // Philip Ewing/Staff
ABOARD THE AMPHIBIOUS TRANSPORT DOCK NEW YORK — This ship’s arrival in New York this week is a solemn occasion and a time for reflection and all that, but Scoop Deck was glad to hear that other people were having cognitive trouble connecting New York, the squared-away, brand-new warship, to New York, the megalopolis.
Navy ships are powerful instruments of American influence, operated with discipline and expertise. But the name “New York” conjures up images of the faux-wood paneling in the F Line to Brooklyn; scenesters in tight jeans talking about bands you’ve never heard of; astronomical rents; men sleeping on grates on 8th Avenue; and the aroma of human excrement floating out of the sewer.
Chief Electronics Technician (SW/SCW/EXW) Mike Kerrigan agreed that some grittier elements were missing from the brand-new New York. There are a few touches: The crew’s mess is named the “Skyline Café.” The starboard-side main deck passageway is named “Broadway,” and before the ship leaves New York, it will almost certainly acquire a souvenir (or stolen) Broadway street sign from Manhattan.
But Kerrigan said he thought the ship could do still better. (And for the record, he voted for “Hell’s Kitchen” as the name for the crew’s mess.)
“I told the guys, I’m gonna go into the subway and find some of those kids with spray cans and bring ‘em back on board and have ‘em go to town,” Kerrigan laughed. “We’ve got a lot of white space on the walls in the upper V” — the upper vehicle bay.
The New York wouldn’t be complete without a tasteful, but authentic, wall of graffiti, Kerrigan said.
“It’s not commonplace for a Navy ship to do that, but we’re special anyway,” he said.
New York, meet New York
November 3rd, 2009 | Life at Sea Maritime operations Photos Ships | Posted by Phil Ewing
Crew members aboard the New York got a tour of the harbor Monday that tourists would dream of // Philip Ewing/ Staff
ABOARD THE AMPHIBIOUS TRANSPORT DOCK NEW YORK — Reveille was at 0400 Monday morning, and the 1MC crackled with a familiar brassy introduction and an unmistakable baritone:
“Start spreaadin’ the newwwwws! I’m leaavin’ todaaaaay!”
The sun had not yet risen over the clear morning in the anchorage off Brighton Beach where this ship had spent Sunday, but the atmosphere aboard the New York was already electric. Mayor Michael Bloomberg had distributed 100 “FDNYPD” ball caps in the crew’s mess the night before. The Yankees had won. The Navy ship with the supernatural link to its namesake was about to visit for the first time.
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
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.