ha, now this is fun...
hmm. the carrier is the old hen of the fleet, it only has 2 hangar bays, where i believe the other carriers have 3. that makes a difference in how much room the aviation maintanance personnel have to work and how much stuff we can store, etc etc. no nuclear power, so engineers on the kitty hawk go through hell. go down to 1 or 2 main engine areas and you'll feel like you're descending into hell, and the poor guys stay worn out. its like that on other boats, but the hawk stays falling apart because of its age. the Japanese Ship Repair Facility performs miracles every time we're in port. we just were outfitted for the super hornet aircraft a year ago, so we've got VFA-102 (squadron) with them, and we're one of the few carriers not to have tomcats anymore. they're now obsolete, especially to us.
my job is aviation medicine on the carrier. my Senior Medical Officer loves my background so every time I'm in port I either go TAD (temporary assigned duty) to the Naval Hospital for background FLEET MARINE FORCE training with the FMF corpsmen there or to the Marines in Okinawa, or to the Air Force in Yokota. I have long watches underway on the flight deck, and that's about it other than paperwork and fixing what electronics in medical i can with my basic training in that area. I'm in a repair locker, so I do firefighting drills all the time underway as well.
I actually went to the Navy's Basic Electronics Common Core School in Great Lakes and was all set to be an Electronics Technican, but after I graduated that tortorous school, they made me an offer to crossrate to corpsman based on what I did before the Navy, so I did. It helps me with my humanitarian aid work when I'm able to take leave.
ship morale is low. this is the hardest duty in the navy according to most, because unlike the states, we have to think of operational readiness at all times.. we have to be able to deploy much faster than the carriers in the states, and as such, we also spend more time out to sea at irregular intervals for training and "presence" purposes. we have longer working hours and will often have to work weekends to fufill training and mission requirements. we were all worried about having to stay out to sea if taiwan started talking smack to china in may, but we got lucky and they stayed focused on their own problems. you have to stay here 3 years rather than the 2 in the states, so people get mad about that too.
hey we're not fighting in iraq or afghanistan, so its not that bad. and japan is a really nice place, if you don't spend all your time in a bar or on base. we get great ports too, especially now that the ship has weeded out the majority of its true bad apples who got us a lot of bad publicity in 2002 (beating up Japanese nationals, drunk driving, bar fights, etc)
i feel for the guys in iraq and afghanistan, so i try not to bitch and complain too much, even though a sailor who isn't complaining is supposed to be the one you worry about.
things will get much more interesting it seems with n. korea acting up, the missile defense ship showing up in the fall and the threat of terrorism in SE Asia's vital shipping lanes.
any other questions, i'm around for a few more weeks to answer them to the best of my ability, and then i'll be back in the fall.
: Actually, US Naval personnel are much more visable in Singapore than they were during the 90's. It is obviously becoming a frequent port of call for the Navy. Singapore has thwarted SEVERAL terrorist attacks that were planned to be carried out in Singapore. One was a planned attack on the Israeli embassy and one was an attack on US ships. Singapore is tiny, but their military packs one hell of a punch.
