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INSIDE
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Celebrating Women’s History Month
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Images of the Week
A Day in the Life: HTs FROM THE EDITOR
It may not count as a milestone, but we’re roughly halfway through this deployment. Not that we’re making little red Xs on our calendars or anything. So as the work keeps demanding these long days of us, we’re going to allow ourselves to look at the remainder of our time away from our loved ones as though we get to coast downhill from here to Virginia. In this issue we take the first of several looks at what awaits us in our new homeport (whaddya mean they keep the ocean on that side? What’s a hurricane, anyway?). It must be a sign that seeing our parents, spouses and children again is just around the corner. And boy do we miss you all. Also in this issue, we answer the burning question: “What does an HT exactly do? Do they just sit around waiting for the next pair of coveralls to get flushed down a toilet?” The answer might surprise you. After you flip to the back of the issue to make goo-goo noises at baby photos, take a moment and get to know Hospitalman Lee. Good luck recognizing him around the ship, though. He doesn’t always wear that mask.
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U.S. Navy photo by Lt. Dustin Wood
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Blue Blasters honor fallen Service Members
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he Blue Blasters of Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 34 painted the names of fallen service members on their F/A-18C Hornets, March 23, to honor them. Lt. Dustin Wood started the project, Feb. 28, after learning of the death of a high school friend and the severe wounding of a college roommate. Hoping to create a memorial that would provide a constant reminder of the sacrifices made by fellow service members, Wood solicited names of friends and family members lost in Operation Enduring Freedom from fellow Blue Blasters and Carrier Strike Group (CSG) 9 personnel. “The day-to-day rigor of life on the carrier makes it easy for all of us to lose focus on our primary mission, supporting ground forces in Afghanistan,” Wood said. “By replacing pilot names with those of service members killed in action (KIA), the Blue Blasters hope to provide some perspective on this vital mission and pay respect to those who have made the ultimate sacrifice. The KIA names serve as a symbol
Story by Lt. j.g. Chelsea Decker
of the pride, selflessness and teamwork that is prevalent throughout our strike group.” Intelligence Specialist 2nd Class Nathan Moore, also with VFA-34, said he was honored to sponsor a close family friend. “It’s easy to get bogged down about your own trivial things with living on the ship, and this is a great opportunity to drive home what we are doing out here. It prevents us from being detached by being on the ship while they are on land,” Moore said. “It means a lot to the members who get to sponsor the name of a loved one on a jet.” VFA-34 is one of nine squadrons deployed with Carrier Air Wing (CVW) 2 aboard the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72) as part of CSG 9. CSG 9 is comprised of Lincoln, CVW 2, guided-missile cruiser USS Cape St. George (CG 71) and Destroyer Squadron 9, composed of guided-missile destroyers USS Momsen (DDG 92) and USS Sterett (DDG 104).
U.S. Navy photo by MCSA Josh Walters
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ailors assigned to Abraham Lincoln commemorated Women’s History Month, March 30. Command Master Chief Susan Whitman opened the celebration in the hangar bay, describing the important roles women have played throughout naval history and the positive impacts they have made. Following Whitman’s opening remarks, Hospital Corpsman 1st Class Laura Blanco read a poem entitled “More than a Woman.” “Even here, my strength is needed. Often my maternal instincts are used when I put my Sailors before me; when their needs become my needs, their battles become my battles, and their sorrows become my sorrows,” Blanco read. Lt. Megan Donnelly, the 2012 Capt. Joy Bright Hancock Leadership Award recipient and guest speaker for the
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THE PENNY PRESS
celebration event, said she appreciates the increased number of options for women in the Navy. “I continue to be thankful and excited for the opportunities the Navy presents to everyone, regardless of gender. The Sailors I am lucky enough to serve with, and the chance to continue to excel, makes everything worth it,” she said. In the first Gulf War, women represented 15 percent of all naval personnel fighting on the ground. Since then, the repeal of the combat exclusion law allowed women to serve on combatant ships in 1994, and a recent change in policy made it possible for women to serve on submarines for the first time in 2010. More than 54,000 female active duty Sailors and more than 10,000 female Reservists serve in the Navy today.
U.S. Navy photo by MCSN Benjamin Liston U.S. Navy photo by MCSN Benjamin Liston U.S. Navy photo by MCSN Zachary Welch U.S. Navy photo by MCSA Josh Walters
U.S. Navy photo by MCSN Zachary Welch
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incoln will be pulling into Norfolk in a just a few months, and with many of her Sailors being brand new to the Norfolk/Newport News/Hampton Roads area, there’s a lot to learn about coastal Virginia before it becomes the ship’s homeport for the foreseeable future. The Hampton Roads metropolitan area is home to more than 1.5 million people and is made up of 16 different cities and counties, including Newport News (the ship’s home by early 2013), and 17 different military installations from all five branches of service. It is the largest concentration of U.S. military forces in the world. “It’s an overall large area,” said Master Chief Aircraft Maintenanceman Ronald E. Taylor, who first moved to Hampton Roads in 1987. “All of the cities bleed into each other. Anywhere from Virginia Beach all the way up to Newport News is all one big area.” An area so geographically large, and with a population to match, also comes with numerous opportunities for outdoor recreation, education, entertainment and culture. “There are a lot of things to do,” said Taylor. “Busch Gardens theme park and Colonial Williamsburg are just a 20-minute drive from Newport News. There are also a lot of museums and a few semi-professional sports franchises.” All of the major attractions in Hampton Roads are within an hour’s drive from anywhere in the populated area, barring traffic. There’s something for everybody, said Aviation Structural Mechanic 2nd Class Don Paguyo, a resident of Chesapeake, Va. There are numerous night spots along Shore Drive, and Atlantic and Pacific avenues in Virginia Beach for nightlife
and museums, and beachfront playgrounds and an aquarium for people looking for something more family-oriented. “You can do just about anything you want if you have a car,” said Paguyo. “It’s a mixture of everything: city life, beach life and suburban life.” With so much to do spread out around such a large area, traffic is an ongoing headache in Hampton Roads. Commuters have been known to sit in traffic for hours in the afternoon waiting to transit the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel. Knowing the back roads is the best way to avoid most traffic, said Taylor. “Take a day on the weekend, just get in a car and drive,” said Taylor. “Start with the major freeways, learn your way around both sides of the tunnel and then learn the back roads.” A major cause of many traffic jams is weather. Weather can be unpredictable and can change rapidly with highs in the 100s with over 90 percent humidity in the summer to lows in the teens and sometimes single digits and high winds from the Atlantic Ocean in the winter. “Weather is the only thing I can complain about,” said Paguyo with a grin. “Virginia is the only place I’ve been where you can see all four seasons in one day.” From the climate to the people and places, Hampton Roads is an area full of variety and diversity, largely due to the military’s large presence there. For more information on the area, visit hamptonroads.com. This is the first in a series of articles highlighting Norfolk and the Hampton Roads area as we begin the countdown to our new Virginia homeport.
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U.S. Navy photo by MC2 Jonathan Idle U.S. Navy photo by MCSA Joshua Walters
U.S. Navy photo by MC2 Jonathan Idle
U.S. Navy photo by MC3 Chris Johnson U.S. Navy photo by MC2 Jonathan Idle
U.S. Navy photo by MCSA Karolina Martinez
U.S. Navy photo by MC3 Chris Johnson
Images of the Week
U.S. Navy photo by MCSN Zachary Welch
U.S. Navy photo by MC2 Jonathan Idle
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board Lincoln, Sailors from many different rates work together to keep the ship operational. All of the rates on board play very important roles keeping the ship afloat and up to Navy standards by performing specific tasks essential to Abe’s day-to-day operations. For example, Reactor department keeps the ship moving. Without the reactor team aboard, the ship would be chugging along on diesel fuel. Electrician’s mates have to keep the ship from losing electricity because without power, everything electronic on the ship would be useless. M a c h i n i s t ’s mates have to fix all of the mechanical p r o b l e m s aboard the ship; if a machine broke down and didn’t get fixed, eventually the whole ship would cease to function. Hull maintenance technicians (HTs) are one of those critical rates-the ones we all rely on to keep the ship we call home up and running. Without our HTs, the ship would soon grind to a halt. “The ship would sink if we didn’t have HTs on board,” explained Hull Maintenance Technician 2nd Class Benjamin Vigness. “If all of the pipes broke, then the ship wouldn’t have water. If the firemain broke, it could prevent us from fighting any fires or other casualties.” HTs fix water pipes, firemains, steam systems, brackets on televisions, catapult steam pipes, fire pumps and machine gun mounts. HTs also keep busy fixing the sewage tanks and unclogging the toilets. No matter how small the problems HTs
THE PENNY PRESS
face might seem, they work hard to keep those smaller issues from affecting the ship’s ability to function properly. HTs are always prepared to keep the ship at its peak operational readiness. “When the catapult steam pipes break, we have to fix them right away,” said Vigness. “Until we are done fixing them, flight operations have to be stopped.” There are three different shops that comprise the HT community aboard the ship: the wood shop, the weld shop and the pipe shop. The weld shop, as the name suggests, r e p a i r s everything that needs to be welded back into place. W h e n welding jobs are completed, welders have to smooth out what has been welded with a grinder. HTs in the weld shop deal with sheet metal fabrication as well, where thin metal is bent into various shapes. The pipe shop repairs all of the piping systems on the ship, unclogs everything that can be (and is) clogged, and performs qualifications for brazing and ultra-sonic testing. The HTs use ultra-sonic testing to check whether pipes have proper seals. Before starting a job to replace any piping, HTs have to tag out the piping and retrieve work authorizing forms. After tagging out the pipe and getting the proper paperwork, HTs cut the faulty pipes out and then replace them. Brazing requires the HTs doing the work to man a fire watch, wherein one of them must keep an eye out for fire nearby. A
See HTs, page 15
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Adrienne Elizabeth Gerrard
Mason Alexander Macedo
Joshua Lawrence Pugh
Emma Marie Sinclitico
Kaia Madison Howell
Fernanda Ariel Salinas
Weight: 8 lbs., 2 oz. Length: 20.5 in. Father: AM2 Jace Gerrard
Born: March 16 Time: 3:42 a.m. Weight: 6 lbs., 13 oz. Father: ABE1 Larry Pugh
Born: March 19 Time: 5:10 p.m. Weight: 7 lbs., 9 oz. Length: 19.5 in. Father: Lt. j.g. Brent Howell
Chloe Brielle Matteson
Born: March 31 Time: 1:32 a.m. Weight: 8 lbs., 5 oz. Length: 21 in. Father: MA1 William Matteson
Born: March 1 Time: 7:54 p.m. Weight: 6 lbs., 13 oz. Length: 21 in. Father: MMFN Carlos Macedo
Born: March 18 Time: 11:30 p.m. Weight: 8 lbs., 1 oz. Length: 20 in. Father: ET2 Brian Sinclitico
Born: March 23 Weight: 6 lbs., 9 oz. Length: 19 in. Father: AM3 Abel Salinas
Photo and information provided by MCSA Josh Walters
Know Your Shipmate
HN JoJuan Lee Dental Dept.
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ospital Corpsman JoJuan Lee, of Lincoln’s Dental department, joined the Navy in October 2009 after a friend encouraged him to enlist. As a dental tech assistant, he is responsible for ensuring the health and cleanliness of the crew’s teeth. “My favorite part of my job is helping Sailors by cleaning teeth,” he said. “I enjoy making people’s smiles brighter.” Lee, a Detroit native, lived in the Motor City for most of his life until he moved to Houston for his last year of high school. He later moved to Ohio to attend Cleveland State University to study business administration. While the ship is deployed, he spends his free time helping his shipmates study for their surface and air warfare pins, and he also enjoys passing time playing basketball (when he can), writing and spending time with his friends. His favorite part about being deployed is experiencing the various countries the ship visits. “This deployment is really opening my eyes to the different kind of people and cultures that are in these foreign countries,” he said. “It’s something that most people in the world don’t get the chance to see or do.”
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HTs (Continued) brazing stick is made to make a seal around a copper pipe so any liquids going through the pipe won’t leak. To be able to braze two pieces of pipe together, the HT has to use an oxygen and acetylene torch to prevent the flame from burning through the pipe. “I don’t do the same thing every day,” said Hull Maintenance Technician 1st Class Harmon Hazelwood. “You really don’t know what is going to happen until it happens, which makes it really challenging to plan anything.” The wood shop makes plaques, shadowboxes, command boards, department head boards and skateboards out of oak. Every wood project requires HTs to use the shop’s table saw, band saw, grouter and wood finisher. Before a plaque can be cut out, the plank has to go to the engraving shop to get the shape of the carrier burned into it with a laser. Before a project is complete, a coat of wood finisher must be added to give the wood a red, shiny polish. “There is a lot to like working in the wood shop,” said Hull Maintenance Technician 3rd Class Chris Skowronski. “There is a lot of freedom being up here because I am able to be creative with any project.” The role HTs play aboard the ship is an important one: keeping the ship afloat. From fixing the steam pipes to maintaining the catapults, no matter the job, it is the ready response of HTs that make everything aboard Abe operation ready. Vigness said working as an HT is preparing him to take on anything the civilian world might throw his way. “I really like my job as an HT,” he said. “I don’t think there is anything I dislike about it. I came into the Navy to further my education in welding. When I get out of the Navy, I’m going to use everything I learned as an HT in the civilian world.”
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