Wrapping Up and Catching Up

Whew- It has been a wild past two weeks. In some ways they have dragged on and in others it has flown by.

The first officially week of training wasn't really anything special, at least from the view of the trainees going through it. It consisted of firefighting and damage control, something that has been drilled into us over and over and over again the past four years of school. We went through all the different types of fires and techniques to extinguish them. After a few days of class (and painfully dull powerpoints) we went out into the compound where there was a mock ship with an engine inside of it.

From there, the instructors lit up the fires and we went in in teams of 4 (two groups of two people on 1 1/2 inch hoses) and fought the blaze and put it out. The worst part of  it was standing around the heat in full firefighting gear sweating waiting our turn. Fighting the actual fire wasn't bad at all, my crew and I got it out pretty quick. I have noticed that at every single place I've gone and done firefighting (Cal Maritime, Texas A&M College Station, Texas A&M Galv, and now here) a different air pack called a self contained breathing apparatus (SCBA) is used and rigged totally differently. This is kinda frustrating having to learn a new pack everytime, but on the bright side, I think I've learned how to use every pack in use in ship board firefighting.

This past week of training was probably the funnest week we'll have here....we got to shoot guns!! We had to shoot and qualify using the Navy standard test on the 9mm Beretta Hand gun, M14 semi-auto rifle, and the 12 gauge shotgun. We would spend half a day learning the weapon. We had to learn of course how to use it properly, disassemble/assemble the weapon, etc. Then, the next half of the day we spent shooting the gun.

We shot the pistol at ranges of 3, 7, and 15 yards. We were required to draw the pistol from the holster and fire of various amounts of rounds in various time frames. Some of the shooting sequences we also had to reload. I've never shot a pistol before and from what I've heard it can be tough, but I didn't have a problem with it at all. The toughest part was that it was rigged for a righty, and so some the magazine release button and the slide forward switch were kinda tricky and awkward to get at. I qualified with a score of 210 out 280...a sharpshooter on the Navy scale I think. A score of 180 was required to qualify.

The M14 was the gun I was most nervous about, because we had all been hearing it had a horrible kick and it was difficult to qualify for. However, it was quite the opposite. We shot from 25 yards in prone, kneeling, and standing positions. However, the target we were using was scaled down so even though we were 25 yards, the target looked as it would at 200. It made it a tad bit hard to see. We went through the course twice and I think we fired a total of 400 rounds each (we had some freebies to use to get sited in and whatnot). While shooting, I could tell when I missed wide a couple times, but when you shoot inside the rings (there are 2 rings with a dark bulls eye circle in the middle) its hard to tell how well you are doing. In order to qualify, we had to hit the bulls eye pretty consistently. I was pretty nervous when we finished and were standing at the 25 yard line looking at the target. But when we got up close, I saw that I had blown it away. I aced the course with a score of 160 out of 180. To qualify we had to score 140.

The shotguns were the funnest. We had to shoot starting from 25 yards away, and move up the course to 10 yards. Firing at 20 and 15 as well as the 25 and 10. Like the other courses, we were on the clock. We had 3 minutes to shoot off 20 rounds and get 30 hits each on 3 separate targets. We were shooting buck shot. It was so much fun. Just feeling the power of the gun and the boom got the blood rushing. If shooting the M14 was like driving a Lincoln, then shooting the shotgun was like driving a BMW. I blew the target away once again, the shotgun isn't a really hard weapon to aim.

Friday was the big day we've been waiting for since starting on Aug 29th....PAY DAY! Where did I go? Straight to the mall to get myself a fancy pants Iphone 4. I got a heck of a deal, I got the Iphone with all the bells and whistle that go with it for only 230 bucks and no security deposit! The salesman really gave me the hook up, I was expecting to have to lay down another 400 or so. I'm already addicted to it.

On Saturday Harry, Jessica, and I made a day trip to NYC. We were hoping to put it off and make a weekend trip, but Jessica is an engineer (who are always in short supply) and left to go back to Virginia Beach today for a ship assignment. So we took the NJ Transit train at Princeton to Penn Station, which is right next to Madison Square Gardens. Its just around an hour ride. It was pretty cool getting off and bam...you are in the heart of NYC. We mosied on down to Time's Square and mingled among the crowds and took it all in.

We thought about taking in a Broadway show, but decided we didn't have the time since we were wanting to head back to Jersey that night. From there, we walked to the Empire State Building. The line was pretty long, and since I've already gone up once before, I decided to pass. Harry and Jessica went ahead and got in line and I took off for a stroll with no destination in mind.

I stopped at a vendor on the street and got a hotdog for a couple bucks...oh boy was it good! I wound up on 6th Avenue where all the shops are. I went passed a Macy's, but I'm not sure if it was the flagship store or not. From there I stumbled onto Park Avenue and Madison Avenue. I must have been in the wrong part, because I didn't see any fancy shops and what not. It was actually a pretty quiet part of town where there didn't seem to be any tourists...just actually NYC'rs. So I ordered another hot dog and did some people watching on a bench. From there, Harry and Jessica still hadn't finished, so I spotted a whole-in-the-wall Irish pub and ordered a brew and chatted it up with some locals and some Irishman. It was the first time I met and Irish person in and Irish pub!

When we grouped back up together, Harry and Jessica wanted to go back to 6th Avenue and do some shopping so that's just what we did. From there, we caught the subway and headed down to the financial district on the lower west side. We got off and went down to the World Trade Center sites. It was a pretty somber experience. It was so hard to believe what had happened there 10 years ago, and the fact that we were standing right there. The Freedom Tower is quite impressive. We of course weren't able to get into the actual sight were the memorial is being built, but just peeking through the gates was enough. After a few minutes of gazing and pondering at the WTC we stopped at a rally going on for Ron Paul. I think every officer in the NYPD was there ready to keep things in check. It was just crazy.

From there we walked over to the water front, where we could see the Statue of Liberty from the docks where some colossal multi-million dollar yachts were docked. From there I could see the Brooklyn Bridge as well as the anchorage where I anchored while I was on the tug/barge a few winters back. And I think I saw the general area where I spent time on Skybird anchored right outside the city. Good memories came flooding back from both trips.

After that, we started our way back to the subway and NJ, stopping off for dinner. We walked by the Battery and up into Tribecca for some pretty good NY style pizza and a couple of beers. It felt good to be off our feet after walking all day long. After pizza we caught the subway back up to Penn Station where we caught the NJ Transit line back to Princeton in just the nick of time. A few minutes later and we would have had to wait an hour. HOWEVER, we all crashed on the train. I woke up and looked behind me where Harry and Jessica had been sitting and they were gone. I looked over to a girl next to me and she told me they had taken off. A few seconds later they came snaking back. They had woken up a few seconds earlier and saw the Penn Station logo outside the train and darted for the doors....to just miss them. So off we went to the next station in Hamilton, a few minutes away. We got off and hailed a cab back to East Windsor and the Holiday Inn. Our little snafu on the train cost us 10 extra bucks on the cab fair, but it could have been far worse. Lesson learned! We made it back and all crashed from a long day of adventuring.

And now it is Sunday. We woke up and ate breakfast with Jessica and the rest of the engineers and saw them off on the bus back to Virginia Beach. We all felt pretty jealous. Its gonna be a long 5 weeks here, especially now that one of the funnest weeks is behind us. Our numbers are down from 30 to about 12, but there will be more new hires coming in a couple of weeks.

This next week I have quick reaction force training. We take turns dressing as terrorists and SWAT members and have to find the terrorists on the mock ship, subdue them, and put them in handcuffs. The best part.....we get to shoot each other with the Beretta! Only, we will be using soap bullets. Every effort is made to make all the training as realistic as possible.