Booby Birds and Busts (No, not what you think)

CARR Families and Friends,

First off, happy upcoming Thanksgiving to all our families and friends – we wish we could be with you, but Christmas is right around the corner…as well as our return.  This week will be busy for all of us as homecoming preparations are in full swing.

The promotion results have been approved and will be announced prior to Thanksgiving – good luck to all our eligible Sailors.  Last week we began leadership training for all personnel eligible for promotion so that we can rapidly get everyone who is selected for promotion frocked.CARR Families and Friends,

First off, happy upcoming Thanksgiving to all our families and friends – we wish we could be with you, but Christmas is right around the corner…as well as our return.  This week will be busy for all of us as homecoming preparations are in full swing.

The promotion results have been approved and will be announced prior to Thanksgiving – good luck to all our eligible Sailors.  Last week we began leadership training for all personnel eligible for promotion so that we can rapidly get everyone who is selected for promotion frocked.

This week we completed reviewing written packages and conducted oral interviews to select our 2012 Sailors of the Year:  The competition was tough and we had lots of superstars to choose from.  Congratulations to:
Senior Sailor of the Year is FC1 Cody Koch
Junior Sailor of the Year is FC2 Justin Gunderson
Blue Jacket of the Year is LSSN Bilal Barnes.

Day 164 – Sunday, November 11th (Veteran’s Day)
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It has been a few days since it has rained, so ETC William Dowe guided us toward a rain storm; however, upon our arrival some pretty severe thunderstorms began.  We took a hit, but all survived.  The good news is that we got all the muck off of us – this not only gets us clean, but dramatically slows down corrosion.  We also noted that our wind indicating system was down; we are not sure if this was from the lightning strike or we just noticed it because we looked for damage following the strike.  Regardless, the system is necessary to support flight operation and we did not have the part on board.

Day 165 – Monday, November 12th
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Today we continued steaming in the Eastern Pacific in hope of getting at least one more bust…unfortunately, no joy today.

Day 166 – Tuesday, November 13th
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We had the pleasure of reenlisting GSM2 Kevin Barrientos today on the Mess Decks – upon our decommissioning he is headed to San Diego to serve in USS HOWARD (DDG 83).

Today we received a waiver to fly our helicopter using a hand held wind measuring device – we expect to get the replacement part in Panama to restore our installed system.

Day 167 – Wednesday, November 14th
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While conducting a routine patrol today, our embarked SH-60B helicopter identified a single engine motor boat and immediately closed to investigate.  Once the vessel spotted our helicopter, it started to jettison several large packages into the water and proceeded towards Colombian territorial waters at high speed.  After the vessel failed to establish radio contact, CARR received permission to conduct warning shots from the helicopter.  After three bursts of warning shots across the vessel’s bow, the vessel stopped and our embarked Coast Guard LEDET loaded onto our rigid hull inflatable boat and then boarded the vessel.
After securing the three personnel on board, we proceeded to recover the jettisoned packages.  In total, we recovered 551 lbs of marijuana and 30 kg of cocaine with a wholesale value of $1.2M.

We were supposed to pull into Panama tomorrow; however, we will now be delayed as a result of having to process our bust.

Day 168 – Thursday, November 15th
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Instead of pulling into Vasco Nunez de Balboa, we remained at sea and continued with preservation efforts along while searching for traffickers.

Today we had a Booby bird arrive on our O2 level.  The bird looked sick; he settled in under our forward mast to recoup.  We provided the bird with some fresh water, food, and some time alone to recover.  They were called boobies because of the birds are not startled by humans which allowed explorers to walk right up to them and kill them for food – as a result many species were easily hunted to extinction.

Great job to IC1 Derek Hotop who led repairs of our wind indicating system.  Great job troubleshooting and conducting repairs to restore our system to full operation.

Day 169 – Friday, November 16th
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Surprisingly we woke up and found that the Booby Bird was perched on the side of CARR flapping its wings, looking much healthier than the previous day.  After land was in sight, the bird took off and appeared to have recovered.  Thankfully we got some rain which washed away all the gifts the bird had left on the O2 level.

Congratulations to LS1 Daniel Shelton who reenlisted today on the O3 level.  He will be heading to USS George HW Bush (CVN 77) after we decommission CARR in March.

Today was our last day of scheduled helicopter operations until they fly off – they have used all their allocated flight hours.  Our embarked helicopter, VENOM 502, flew 570 mishap free hours this deployment.
Great job to everyone in the helicopter detachment, flight deck crew, and our two air controllers.  OS2 James Nastasi and OSC Chris Van are our two Anti-Submarine/Anti-Surface Tactical Air Controllers (ASTACs) – their job is to brief the flight crew prior to their departure and then work with the helo throughout their mission.  Thank you to both OS2 Nastasi and OSC Van; your hard work this deployment was integral to our many interdictions over the last six months!

We were supposed to arrive in Vasco Nunez de Balboa today; however, our pier space was occupied by a coastal freighter – our husbanding agent thinks we can pull in sometime tomorrow afternoon.

Day 170 – Saturday, November 17th (Vasco Nunez de Balboa, Panama) ==========================================
This morning our husbanding agent informed us that our pier would not be available until midnight.  Since we need some stores and needed to offload someone to catch a flight, we entered Panamanian territorial waters to conduct an onload via small boat.

Upon arrival of the small boat our husbanding agent had news that we could be pierside at 2200.  As it turned out we made it pierside at 2245. Even though it was late at night, this may have been our smoothest sea and anchor detail of deployment – Great job to all involved!!

Congratulations to our latest Sailors to complete their Enlisted Surface Warfare Specialist (ESWS) qualification: STG3 Matthew Baker, GMSN William Carpenter,  EN3 Ryan Dahl, SHSN Ulises Hernandez, CTTSN Nathanial Weston, and STG3 Larry Whitehead.  73% of our Sailors are now qualified ESWS with a few short weeks remaining to reach our goal of 85%.

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Jessica Meissner    OMBUDSMAN
April Linton        Co-OMBUDSMAN
Jackie Lease        FRG President

Please join CARR along with our OMBUDSMAN and Family Readiness Group:

CARR
https://www.facebook.com/FFG52
OMBUDSMAN
http://www.facebook.com/pages/USS-CARR-
ombudsman/219688138070847?sk=wall
CARR Family Readiness Group
www.facebook.com/USSCARRFRG

Sailors Name
Department/Division
USS CARR (FFG 52)
FPO AE 09566-1506
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Until next Sunday, stay safe CARR Family and Friends!

CDR Patrick Kulakowski
Commanding Officer
USS CARR (FFG 52)
“Courage, Will, Determination!”