Posts filed under “Navy”
Ten years on…
Ten years ago, I was Engineering Duty Officer on the USS Hartford (SSN-768), in port in Groton, Connecticut. We were due to leave on a six-month deployment, and were doing last-minute maintenance checks. That day was extraordinary; within hours we had closed out all the maintenance and were effectively ready to go. (And security on [...]
“My Nuclear Life” by Chris Brownfield – a review
My Nuclear Life, written by Christopher Brownfield, was published recently. It chronicles his ~6 year career in the Navy, which primarily consisted of 3 years on the USS Hartford and 1 year in Iraq. I served on board the USS Hartford with Chris for about a year. This post is a review of his book [...]
The Checklist Manifesto – A hugely important book
Back in 2007 I read a fascinating article called “The Checklist” written by Dr. Atul Gawande in the New Yorker. Atul Gawande is a practicing surgeon, MacArthur Fellow, Rhodes Scholar and professor at Harvard Medical School and Harvard School of Public Health. The article described how a doctor convinced a group of hospitals in Michigan [...]
USS Hartford collision
So my old boat, the USS Hartford, was in a significant collision this week. While transiting (submerged) through the Straits of Hormuz, they ran into the USS New Orleans, an amphibious ship (surface ship that carries Marines). According to reports, about 15 people on the Hartford were hurt, though luckily none were seriously injured. The [...]
Panama Canal crossing video
I got a kick out of seeing this video. It’s a timelapse video taken of a cruise ship going through the Panama Canal. The fun bits with locks are at the beginning and end; in the middle there’s quite a large lake that needs to be sailed across. My old boat (the USS Hartford, SSN [...]
Iraqi art exhibition in New York City – Opens Thursday!
This Thursday, May 22nd a very unique art exhibit will open in New York City. It features art from Iraqi artists, most of whom cannot even be publicly identified for their safety. It was a Navy Lieutenant serving in Iraq that found this art and worked to bring it over to the United States to [...]
A pair of brass …
So I was reading a little bit about General Petraeus today in the New York Times. I took a quick look at his Wikipedia article and found something very interesting, his wife. While a cadet at the US Military Academy, aka West Point, he dated the commanding officer’s daughter!! WOW!! For a 19/20-year old cadet [...]
Career advice when leaving the military – a potential lifeline
I recently traded some interesting e-mails with Charlie O’Donnell, the Founder/CEO of Path101. If you haven’t heard of them now, I wouldn’t be surprised as they’re still very much in their development phase. But I think in the coming few years you certainly will have heard of and experimented with their website. Path101 aims to [...]