14 May 2011
Ahoy There, Shipmates!
It was another early-morning carrier Unrep/Vertrep;
all hands were at their stations, Captain Hartley had taken his customary place
on the port bridge wing, and I was about to assume the wheel. The Captain had
already ordered “Dip Romeo”; the red-and-yellow stood out from the halyard
to a brisk wind in the ‘standby’ position, the coffee mess was
recharged for another long morning, all replenishment and maneuvering stations had
reported “manned and ready”, and our stalwart “Crusaders”
were airborne and already depositing their first “picks” on the
Bird-Farm’s flight deck. As she had done safely and successfully nearly
60 times since leaving New Jersey in January, Arctic was
prepared to transfer fuel and supplies to…
USS Ronald Reagan and Crusader 17
Wait a minute! That isn’t Enterprise,
coming up fast from astern…and that isn’t Leyte Gulf off to starboard!
And that ship off to port…why, that looks just like us!! What’s
going on?!
No, it wasn't an episode of 'Twilight Zone'. It was our first Unrep this deployment
with the ‘new kid on the Gulf’, USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76), her
escort cruiser USS Chancellorsville (CG-62), and one-stop-shopping supply ship
USNS Bridge (Arctic’s
younger “sister”—T-AOE 10)—and the first step in the
long process of turning-over operations in this part of the world to another Carrier
Strike Group (CSG). Does this mean that we are heading home? No, no quite yet…our
departure from these water is still about a month away. Just as we slowly
moved into Carl Vinson’s
group’s duties, now “Ronnie” and her consorts will begin that
process, first working with us and finally, around the second week of June,
relieving us.
USNS Bridge
The long trip back north up the Red Sea,
and then west across the Med, into the Atlantic
and then home is within sight, and what a lovely view it is!
I hope you’ll all enjoy these photos
of our soon-to-be reliefs…they aren’t quite as pretty as we are but
give ‘em a chance. We were certainly glad to see ‘em!
Tom Epps
Able Seaman
USNS Arctic
Gulf of Oman
USS Chancellorsville
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