Not exactly high tech news, but noteworthy nonetheless. In another move that signals how the machine is slowly sapping the elegance from the military experience, the Navy just released this message:
FM COMNAVAIRFOR SAN DIEGO CA//N43//
TO USS KITTY HAWK
USS ENTERPRISE
USS NIMITZ
USS DWIGHT D EISENHOWER
USS CARL VINSON
USS THEODORE ROOSEVELT
USS ABRAHAM LINCOLN
USS GEORGE WASHINGTON
USS JOHN C STENNIS
USS HARRY S TRUMAN
USS RONALD REAGAN
SUBJ/REMOVAL OF CAPTAINS GIGS FROM ALL AIRCRAFT CARRIERS//
GENTEXT/REMARKS/1. OPNAV N88 APPROVED THE NAVAL AVIATION ENTERPRISE (NAE) CARRIER READINESS TEAM (CRT) REQUEST TO REMOVE THE CAPTAIN’S GIG FROM ALL CV/CVNS. REMOVAL OF THE CAPTAIN’S GIG WILL REDUCE MAINTENANCE COSTS AND FREE UP VALUABLE HANGAR BAY SPACE.
2. PER REF A AND B, ALL CV/CVNS ARE REQUESTED TO PREPARE THEIR CAPTAIN’S GIG FOR DISPOSITION WITHOUT REPLACEMENT IAW REF C. SHIPS SHOULD COORDINATE THESE EFFORTS WITH THEIR TYCOM N43 MAINTENANCE PROGRAM MANAGER (MPM).
3. THE FOLLOWING IS A LIST OF THE CAPTAIN’S GIGS ASSIGNED BY SHIP AND ACTION REQUIRED (READ IN THREE COLUMNS):
SHIP CAPTAIN’S GIG ACTION REQUIRED
CV 63 10MPE9319 COMPLETE REF C REQUIREMENTS
CVN 65 12MPE9203 NO FURTHER ACTION REQUIRED
CVN 68 12MPE9201 COMPLETE REF C REQUIREMENTS
CVN 69 40PE9004 NO FURTHER ACTION REQUIRED
CVN 70 40PE761 NO FURTHER ACTION REQUIRED
CVN 71 40PE8514 COMPLETE REF C REQUIREMENTS
CVN 72 33PE8701 COMPLETE REF C REQUIREMENTS
CVN 73 13MPE9902 COMPLETE REF C REQUIREMENTS
CVN 74 33PE9006 COMPLETE REF C REQUIREMENTS
CVN 75 33PE9007 COMPLETE REF C REQUIREMENTS
CVN 76 10MPE9308 COMPLETE REF C REQUIREMENTS
4. REQUEST THAT CAPTAIN’S GIGS BE OFFLOADED AT THE EARLIEST OPPORTUNITY.
5. CAPTAIN’S GIGS MUST BE OFFLOADED BY 30 JUN 09.
6. UPON COMPLETION OF OFFLOAD, SHIPS SHALL NOTIFY THEIR TYCOM N43 MPM AND POC.//
Ah, memories … it seems like just yesterday we’d join the old man for the ride to shore, full of the kind of excitement that always preceded a great liberty call.
So it’s goodbye, trusty friend. Regardless of sea state, you always got us there and back.
– Ward
{ 24 comments… read them below or add one }
Now how will skippers get ashore if carriers moored in harbor or close to harbor vs pierside?
May as well remove Boat deck.
Some DC stupid ruling again.
Crazy.
Maybe place Gigs on E Bay for sales.
Or TV & Movie use.
Yeah Ward, you Officers are now going to have the ride the utility boats like the rest of us squids. Ahh the memories of sitting in a 50′ utility boat with 40 of your shipmates after a rough night ashore. Nothing like the combination of sea spray and puke to cap the end of an exciting evening.
Hello, I’d just start taking a helo EVERYWHERE … how’s that for reducing maintenance costs?
ATM? Helo.
Quick run to Starbucks while at port? Helo.
Get my PT on at the gym? Helo.
Aircraft carrier skippers are brown shoes anyways, they’d probably feel more comfortable! :)
Dan,
That’s what COM 6th Fleet used to do in Gaeta, Italy. A nicely painted H-3 as I recall.
Not to that extreme, but pretty close.
DC2
Been there, done that, DC2. Good times.
Isn’t it funny how we see these tings as good times now. But back in the day when we were in that boat all we could think about was holding it down and praying you could make it back into your rack.
Glad you are a fellow squid Ward. Even if you were a brown shoe.
DC2
I know I’m going to have to get in line, but where can I one? Perfect for InterCoastal cruising
Although I was never on an Aircraft Carrier, I’ve been pretty much on every other type of ship there was during my 25yrs. When I saw them mothball the biggest majority of the Auxiliaries and most of the “real” Amphib ships (the LKA’s), I figured it would be a short time before they gutted another “institution” in the Navy — sad to see…
What next?????? As a young Seaman and Boatswains Mate, I used to love to pull up to some pier overseas and have other boat crews check out my Gig, MWB or Utility Boat. Oh well…glad I’m retired – I miss it, but I sure don’t miss the changes!
I always thought the Captains boats were a bit over the top.
Unlike Ward, I never got a ride in one…no fond memories here.
However, if the helicopter cannot be used, how is the skipper going to Awe the locals?
Having your own boat on the Carrier is a sure fire way to impress the local dignitaries….
And what about security? I overheard the officer in charge of security say one time they run the boat back and forth a couple times before the put the Skipper on it. Just in case….
Understandably, the boat is taking up room where an aircraft could be.
But the carriers are used to impress foreign dignitaries all the time, where they are used for war just some of the time. One more aircraft is not going to make much difference.
So unless they can use the helicopter all the time, it may just be better to make the boat smaller and cheaper.
It seems like they are taking the easy way out by just getting rid of them.
Perhaps they’ll replace the gig. Why couldn’t the Marine’s EFV take over the gig’s mission set?
Hmm.
Note: Ward, I’m sure that you were never a butt shark. :)
VR,
Chief B.
Chief,
Good points. I especially like the comments on senior enlisted providing their honest opnions. I always respected the old salts and everything they taught me. That is definitely a Navy tradition and one I hope we never lose.
And pretty soon the old man will have to give up his quarters, his boy, and his galley.
Another note about the use of the Captain’s Gig. When my boat was in Gaeta, Italy our gig took the president of Italy and Com Sixth Fleet (Adm Borda) from the pier to a 688 sub out in the harbor. That was pretty cool site to see.
DC2
I was an admiral’s aide (AIRLANT), chief, but that’s about it, I think.
Trust me, shipmates, I have no delusions about how things get done. I’m no MBA. I’m a career man.
God bless the chiefs, and God bless the U.S. Navy!
I second that Ward.
First they took away our beards and now they take away the old man’s rowboat.
Go Navy.
As I was feeding mahogany through the planer today, I was chewing my cud on this damned NAVAIR stunt.
I seem to recall, from some moth-eaten corner of my brain, that following the Revolutionary War our first SECNAV (or whatever SECNAV’s progenitor was) wanted to burn all the ships because they were so expensive to crew and keep up. If memory serves, the idea was scuttled because it took too long to build new ones when war came knocking.
Penny wise and pound foolish as Mr. Franklin wrote. And also a pretty good explanation of why Supply Corps chops are staff not line officers.
Take this a modest step of reason further and you see the same thing in how we’ve staffed the services. A foolish reliance on guard and reserve forces because they’re cheaper than regular forces has bit us in the ass. The Army has rode the guard and reserve hard, put them away wet, and then asked them to gallop again the next morning. More tellingly, we’ve had to send Sailors and Airmen to the sandbox to provide manpower for security and convoys.
And this is just a little war.
Apparently there is some sort of sinister contagion in Congress and the Pentagon that has left our leadership with rather startling gaps in memory. Prior to WWI we did not have the forces on active duty to go and save the French from the Germans, after the war we cashiered the forces we worked so hard to build. Just 20 years later we were once again butt-flap in the breeze without the forces to go and save the French from the Germans. Then, we did it all over again! The NORKS get uppity and we have to go scrambling to get it together again. Were it not for our loyal opposition in the Warsaw Pact we’d have surely done it all over again just to be consistent.
Oh, wait, we DID do it all again in the 90s! Once again playing Pollyanna cashing in our Peace Dividend and spending the proceeds on lottery tickets, trying to get the French to like us, and rose-colored glasses for everyone.
Now, rather than beefing up the forces to get the job done, we get guys like Rumsfeld to relabel everything. “Anemic” becomes “lean,” “understaffed” becomes “right-sized,” and “half-assed” becomes “go with whatcha got.” And the skipper of 90,000 tons of warship and American might gets to ride ashore in whatever the Bosun can scare up.
Anyone care to guess what they’ll heave over the side next?
Cheers,
Chief B.
Chief,
You I will venture to guess. How about all the S-3s designed to protect our flat tops from subs. Or what about all the ships we are mothballing with miles still left in their hulls.
You are right, the military is becoming a sad form of what it once was. The FFG-7s are little more than patrol boats now that they have had their one armed bandits removed (missle launcher).
Oh well, we will learn this lesson again after we realize zealots with bombs strapped to them can’t really do us much harm.
DC2
These should start showing up on the navy surplus auction sites.
re: nb
Ouch! That’d leave a mark. Seeing a gig sitting on a pallet at DRMO would be a damned awful sight. Not to mention the love, care, and respect that things get at DRMO: Left in the weather, uncovered, no maintenance, shifted around by a knuckle-dragging forklift “operator”, and eventually sold for a pittance.
One of you knuckleheads with friends, acquaintances, or former cell mates who work for the Smithsonian, Nauticus, and the like had better get on the horn. Better that they end up sitting dry in museum than rotting at DRMO!
Ward, you know anyone with a bit of pull over at USNI?
Cheers,
Chief B.
There’s a butt ton of Gigs, Barges and Util boats sitting at 32nd St San Diego waiting for disposition I imagine? When I came in 1985 even frigates had Gigs and a whale boats. Now there are very few of either and very few Bos’n that can still do fancy work. Now it’s all about the manning “how to do the same job with less people” Nothing else matters. Sad really
To me, all of this is to say that the next president should have some military experience. We need someone guiding our military with some memory of what has happened over the years.
We need the military leaders to tell congress to get their head out of the sand.
Go Navy!!!!!!!
As a former ship mate we are currently restoring a 33′ gig off the USS Consultation it is almost done! Happy sailing.
Doppler Dave,
Speak for yourself as you have no earthly idea what you are saying with the “lot of pissin’ an moaning” subterfuge.
Hi AVCM I have one. I have just about rapped up the restoration on. It is truely a neat boat. Let me know if your interested in it. It is a 33′ USS Constellation with forward and after cabins.
As an “old time” vet on Atlas ARL 7(Korea), I have very fond memories of Gigs and am interested in purchasing one just to see that it is preserved and donated to a Naval museum if at all possible. Can anyone tell me how to contact (deal with) the current powers that be towards that end? Thanks.