Rememberance Day

So this year I'm in Newfoundland for Rememberance Day. Hopefully the weather will hold for the ceremony. VDQ has a marching contingent but a lot of us are only going to be watching with the rest of the crowd.

Unfortunately, with each passing Rememberance Day more of our WW2 veterans disappear and, with them, all their memories and lessons. We need to make sure those guys get the attention they deserve while it's still relevant. If it wasn't for them, we'd all be speaking German right now. Of course, between WW2 vets and the newer Afghanistan vets, we mustn't forget about the other wars, like Korea.

Words fail me, as they often do, in events like this. So please, go out to a ceremony today and thank a vet. Those old gentlemen wearing berets and blazers with patches and medals? Walk up to them, talk to them, thank them.

Remember

Rescuing the Barracuda

So, RENARD 58 was just driving along, doing some navigation training in Sansum Narrows (between Vancouver Island and Saltspring Island), enjoying the (almost) total lack of contacts. It wasn't a particularly nice day, but it wasn't too bad. Then, all of a sudden,

"PAN PAN, PAN PAN, PAN PAN, this is Barracuda..."

Not a big deal, panpans go out all the time, and most of the time they're hours away at best speed. So we just keep on going though I (as OOW), the OIC, and some others on the bridge keep on listening. Victoria Coast Guard got on 16 and asked them what the issue was, and if they had a GPS onboard, which they did, and what their boat looked like. Red sloop, coordinates whatever, stalled engine refusing to start again, in calm winds, 2 souls on board. Now that sounded kind of familiar.

Oh, right, that's because we'd just passed a red sloop with two people on board, the winds were light, and the coordinates were for about 500 yards behind us.

Now, the rules are pretty straightforward, at least as far as what the OOW needs to do. Which is nothing. Or as close to it as possible. Only the Captain can decide whether or not to respond to an emergency, and until he does, the OOW is not to do a single thing. Even turning back towards the stricken vessel (where relevant--like in open ocean or when it's 500 yards away) can be considered as responding, and the ship then is obligated to keep responding until relieved by another more capable asset. The OIC listened in on the conversation between Barracuda and the Coast Guard, and when the CCG said they would put out a broadcast for assistance, he called them up and said we had them visual and would respond. At this point, the sailboat was close to the rocks and, if we left them to their fate, they would surely run aground. Besides, one of the recent Canadian Forces recruiting campaigns calls for us to...

Actual image from a CF recruiting video

...so we did.

We launched the zodiac with a small prize crew team, which included our only engineer, to assess what the problem was with the engine, and hopefully get it started. They tied up to the Barracuda to stop its slow drift aground, and then fiddled for a few minutes. The engineer reported that it was unlikely he could fix the engine at sea, and they would need to put in somewhere. The Barracuda was adamant about waiting for a friend to come give them a tow but, of course, we couldn't very well just leave them in the middle of the narrows so they could run aground, so we offered to tow them to safety.

RENARD's zodiac towing the BARRACUDA alongside

All's well that ends well, we got them onto a public wharf at a small marina, made sure they were ok and would be getting a tow from their friend, did a bit of necessary admin, and went back to our navigation training.

But not before our downright heroic prize crew had gotten their recognition.

LS Pope (Engineer), Lt(N) Laplante (XO), and A/SLt McGowan (JOUT)

with their latest medal and a well-deserved cup of tea

Still alive

So... even though I started a lot of posts in the past year, I haven't finished or posted any. I don't really have any reason for it, other than maybe I keep thinking that they might be a little boring or uninteresting.

Well, I've been in the fleet for almost a year. I've been sick on three different classes of ships, and learned a lot. There have been good times, sucky times, and downright shitty times. And, no, not all the shitty times have involved red hats. I had a chance to try my hand at actually being a leader, not with peers but with actual subordinates. I've even managed to get a bit of warfare stuff in. Those of you who don't know me personally probably don't care about what exactly I've been up to--and those who do know me either know already or don't care--so I'll skip that.

When I started this blog, one fall afternoon all those years ago in my room in Fort Sauvé, I intended to "chronicle my life as a Naval Cadet at the Royal Military College of Canada (and) also chronicle my training." I think I didn't do that very well and, in any case, my experience was anything but usual, and doesn't paint a good picture of life at RMC. Besides, I'm now a Sub-Lieutenant in the fleet, and I'm sure there are other subbies out there, on both coasts, who get bored occasionally and start writing about their lives. Mine is particularly bland.

Since blogging about my life is probably not interesting to most people out there, and isn't terribly relevant. Instead, I intend to realign--and restart--my blogging in a new direction. Though I'm not gifted in prose, brains, knowledge or experience like Lex and Cdr Salamander, I like their style of blogging, and if I'm going to keep writing, I think I should try to emulate their style.

In any case, it's high time I start this thing again.

Getting there

So here I am at "home" again--and by home I mean my mom's house. I spent a few days in sucky Toronto hanging out with the most awesome girlfriend ever (seriously, she bought me a remote controlled helicopter for my birthday, AND didn't get mad at me for wanting to fly it right away... or all the time.) and now I'm getting to spend a day at home enjoying home cooked food.

And in a few hours, I get to start driving again to make my way to Halifax, where I need to find an apartment within a few days. It should be all right. I found apartments in Victoria, twice, within a day or two of starting to look, so I'm not too worried. I actually have a few places I want to look at already.

In any case, I'm glad to be "off" and moving around, but at the same time I'm looking forward to sitting down in my new place, start work, and go back to a regular workout schedule and such.

And now I go on the road again, yeehaw!

Don de Dieu feray valoir

So, it's all over.

In a few weeks, I will be reporting in to my new assignment aboard HMCS VILLE DE QUEBEC (actually "aboard" the shore office, as the ship is still in drydock). It's a whole new challenge and I'm definitely looking forward to it, despite the 130-odd reqs I'll need to start working on. In addition to being posted to a fine ship, I was also promoted to Sub-Lieutenant.

It's been a long and sometimes treacherous road to get here, and I still have a long way ahead, but it feels good to have gotten this far. I've learned a lot about myself through both the good and the bad, and hopefully that will enable me to be a better leader in the future.

It feels weird thinking that for the first time in over five years, I will be out of a training establishment and into an operational unit. It also feels pretty damn good.

For now, that's all I have. See you around the fleet!

Almost there

So, with one week to go, I have passed all four assessed watches and the pre-board, and only need to avoid doing anything blatantly unsafe during my watches (two dogs, an afternoon, and Friday morning...) which shouldn't be too hard. Oh, and the board. Which, I'm sure, is nowhere near as hard as the NOPQ board will be, but that one's way down the road. I'm not taking this board likely, though. It would be embarrassing to get this far with nary a snag only to fall flat on my face on the last step.

The best part? This is a long weekend, so I get to chill out in Vancouver for another day before we go to sea again. Apparently this will be a cool week, too--those of us who haven't gotten all our watches will probably be done by Tuesday night, so the Captain said we'll do "cool things."

In other news, in case I haven't mentioned it, I am posted to the VILLE DE QUEBEC after this is over. From what I understand we won't be sailing for a while, but I guess it'll give me time to get settled in Halifax, and get the OOD stuff out of the way. Should be good. (By the way, if anyone has suggestions for good places to live in Halifax, I'm all ears. I've never been and would rather avoid living in a sketchy part of town.)

Anyways, I'm glad to be almost done. MARS IV was fun, but it's time to move on. Still, now is not the time to celebrate--I'll have all next weekend for that. Ah well, I'll still play videogames all day today and study tomorrow.

Halfway through

Three weeks down, three to go. And a long weekend.

So, it's going a lot better than last time, and I feel a whole lot more confident. We have a little more navigation to do, and then we'll be finishing up OOW training and, eventually, this course will be over and I'll head off into the wild.

Also, I have received my posting: HMCS Ville de Quebec, on the East Coast. Well, at least it's better than a tanker! Seriously though I don't really care which ship I go to, as long as I get to do something.

I don't have much else to say. We're going down to 1 in 6 this week so hopefully I'll get slightly more sleep. Even if I don't, that's cool, too. I think I'm getting used to sleep deprivation.

Anyways, I'll try to write something more when we pull into Esquimalt next weekend. For now, I should grab some dinner and head back to the ship to plan for tomorrow. Being duty nav FTW!