Need to sharpen that killing edge? Try video games!
January 27th, 2010 | Blogs Science and technology Seabees The deckplates | Posted by Phil Ewing
Seabees in Bahrain honed their fighting instinct. // MC2 Stephen Murphy / Navy
All you oldsters just never understood, did you — with your “fresh air,” “outdoor activities” and your “socializing” and such — the younger generation hasn’t been wasting time inside playing “Halo” all these years. It’s been developing itself into a legion of stone-cold killers!
Such is the conclusion from an Office of Naval Research scientist who finds that today’s gamers “perform 10 to 20 percent higher in terms of perceptual and cognitive ability than normal people that are non-game players,” according to this official DoD story:
[ONR program officer Ray] Perez described the war against terrorists as presenting significant challenges to [troops] on the ground because they must be able to adapt their operations to innovative and deadly adversaries who constantly change their tactics.
“We have to train people to be quick on their feet — agile problem solvers, agile thinkers — to be able to counteract and develop counter tactics to terrorists on the battlefield,” said Perez. “It’s really about human inventiveness and creativeness and being able to match wits with the enemy.”
Good point. For example, Scoop Deck’s normal load-out is the ACR (with M203 grenade launcher and holographic sight) and the M1014 shotgun (with suppressor) but sometimes, if it’s a big map, you need the WA2000 sniper rifle (with thermal scope) or if one of these other clowns calls in a helicopter gunship, you need a Stinger to bring it down. See? That’s flexibility across the full spectrum of make-believe warfare.
H/T: Joystiq
A sailor surge in Afghanistan?
December 2nd, 2009 | individual augmentees Morale Personnel Seabees Shore duty The Middle East | Posted by Phil Ewing
Could more sailors -- like these Seabees arriving in Helmand Province last winter -- be bound for Afghanistan? // MC2 Michael B. Lavender / Navy
At first blush, it might not seem like the Navy would be much affected by President Obama’s announcement last night that he is sending 30,000 more troops to land-locked Afghanistan by next year. But there are thousands of mountain sailors across Afghanistan, and it seems likely that more could begin deploying there as part of the president’s surge.
Seabee links
November 23rd, 2009 | Aviation Foreign navies Maritime operations Photos Seabees Ships Submarines The Middle East | Posted by Phil Ewing
Much as these Seabees from Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 3 helped build a camp in Iraq, so too do today's links build better understanding of current events // MC1 Carmichael Yepez / Navy
Heavy equipment operatin’, expeditionary base constructin’, nail hammerin’, toothpick chewin’, buildin’, fightin’ links, bringing you updates and info even to the most austere forward settings:
- The crew of the amphibious transport dock New York gets on national TV; companies put out press releases so people will know their products are involved with it somehow. The captain of its sister ship, the Green Bay? He gets to go on “Good Day Wisconsin.”
- This giant Navy-assembled smoke tube has got to be the craziest bong ever built.
- The unfortunate crew of a Russian Kilo-class diesel-electric attack sub needed some embarrassing help getting back to its homeport in the Baltic Sea.
- Speaking of Russian — and Chinese — submarines, just how quiet are they compared to each other and compared to American boats? The answer is here.
- Speaking of submarines, the fast-attack sub Texas is almost back from its trip to the North Pole, which caused consternation among some Canadians because it wasn’t clear whether the U.S. cleared the trip with Ottawa.
- How long does it take a Navy flight deck to start melting under the heat from a Marine Corps MV-22 Osprey? About 10 minutes.
BU 1 Robert Mitchell, left, and BU1 Wesley Johnson, both of the 31st Seabee Readiness Group, made a final check of a Seabee mascot destined for the new Seabee Museum // James Cencer / Navy
We build, we fight, we visit museums
August 28th, 2009 | Seabees Shore duty The Middle East | Posted by Phil Ewing
BU3 Adrian Trollip, of NMCB 5, worked on a roof at Camp Leatherneck, Afghanistan May 13 // Cpl. Aaron Rooks/ Marine Corps
As Scoop Deck learned during a recent visit to the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility, you can’t swing a reporter’s notebook when you’re downrange without hitting Seabees at work on projects for the war effort. They were at Camp Eggers, in Kabul, Afghanistan; they were at Camp Leatherneck; and at Kandahar Air Field, putting up their trademark wooden buildings in record time. A tour of the Seabees’ new U.S. forces building in Kandahar was especially pleasant; even though it was unfinished, its air conditioning provided an oasis from the heat and the wafting aroma from KAF’s infamous “poop pond.”
So it was great to hear about some other new construction taking place in the Seabee world: Workers broke ground this week on a new home for the Seabee Museum outside Naval Base Ventura County, Calif., the Navy announced. And not that the wooden clubhouse-style buildings at Camp Leatherneck weren’t nice, but the designs for the new Seabee Museum make it look especially luxurious.