Water Taxi

Here we have the Rigid Hulled Inflatable Boat (RHIB) from destroyer USS Ross coming alongside John Lenthall to deliver passengers for transport to our next port of call.  This happens quite often; ships on lengthy patrol need to send crewmembers ashore and receive new hands in turn, and the roomy accomodations of our MSC oilers are tailor-made to facilitate this requirement.  Usually this process is pretty straightforward, but occaisionally things go awry; a change of schedule or other contingency can leave Sailors languishing aboard the oiler, awaiting further transport to the new location of their intended command.  Sometimes, in rare cases, a contingent of Sailors might wander Vandervecken-like for weeks, moving from oiler to oiler, port to port for weeks on end, orphans of the Sea!

In this case, however, Ross's personnel were speedily conveyed to port, and caught their connectiong flights back to the States.  Some of them were going home on-leave, which means we are likely to see them again, quite soon, as they catch their ride back to that distant warship.  Water Taxi, indeed!