The rebuilding of Iraq is just as demanding on sealift operators as the war.
The current missions of the USNS Seay (T-AKR 302) offer a glimpse of the post-war
sealift operations.
The Seay—one of the Military Sealift Command’s Bob Hope class of
large, medium-speed, roll-on/roll-off ships—returned in May from a voyage
delivering equipment for the Third Armored Cavalry Regiment in Kuwait.
After a few days in Newport News, Va., to fill the ship’s stores, perform
some minor maintenance and undergo some routine safety inspections, she was
off again. This time, the Seay pulled into the port of Charleston, S.C., took
on a load of humanitarian and peacekeeping supplies, and headed back to the
Persian Gulf.
The round trip to Kuwait and back usually takes about 56 days, said Chief Mate
Peter K. Strez. “We stop in Greece, coming and going, to refuel,”
he said.
As chief mate, Strez is second in command of the ship. “Basically, I’m
the eyes and ears for the captain on deck,” Strez explained. “He
can’t be everywhere. When he gives an order, I carry it out.”
After the Third ACR shipped its equipment from its base at Fort Carson, Colo.,
to the port of Beaumont, Texas, it took six LMSRs, including the Seay, to move
that gear from Beaumont to Kuwait. Included were Abrams tanks, Bradley fighting
vehicles, humvees and Apache helicopters. “We always carry a mixed cargo,”
said Strez.
The Seay—christened in 1998 at Northrop Grumman’s Avondale Shipyard
in New Orleans—was named for Army Sgt. William M. Seay, who won a posthumous
Medal of Honor in Vietnam. The ship is designed to carry large cargo and to
deliver it quickly.
The Seay can cruise at a speed of 24 knots, which is pretty fast for a vessel
that is almost as big as an aircraft carrier, Strez said. It has six cavernous
decks. Some can be moved up or down to make room for particularly bulky platforms,
such as Chinook helicopters, Strez said.
The decks have countless cloverleaf-shaped vehicle tie-downs built into them.
The cloverleaves attach to heavy, steel chains—each capable of bearing
17,000 pounds of weight—that are used to lash down tanks, trucks and heavy
equipment, he explained. Four are required to restrain a humvee. Eight are needed
for a 70-ton tank.
An Abrams is about the heaviest thing we have to handle here,” Strez
said.
Heavy Seas
The vehicles have to be tied down, so that they won’t move when heavy
seas rock the ship, Strez said. The lashings have to be checked periodically,
because vibrations caused by the ship’s engines can loosen them, he noted.
The Seay’s crew consists of 30 civilian merchant mariners, all employees
of Patriot Contract Services, of Walnut Creek, Calif., which has a contract
to operate six cargo ships in the Ready Reserve Fleet, said William L. Cook,
an MSC public affairs specialist, based in Norfolk, Va.
Six of the crewmembers are women, explained the ship’s master, Capt.
Roger L. Haskell. Female crewmembers have become common on MSC ships. “The
women are just like the men,” he said. “Some are good, and some
aren’t.”
One of the women, in fact, has performed so well that she has been promoted
into the officer ranks. Tamara Becker has been named third mate in the deck
department. Becker, an eight-year veteran of the Merchant Marine, said she earned
the promotion “by meeting all of the requirements and working hard.”
The Seay’s crew even includes a full family. “We have a husband,
wife and daughter on board,” Haskell said. “One of my colleagues
sent his greetings to them,” he joked. “He said, ‘Say hi to
the Brady Bunch.’
“Having a family on board a Navy cargo ship is unusual,” Haskell
admitted. “But it is working out well here.”
On the way out, the ship—wary of terrorist attacks—typically picks
up a protective Navy escort, such as a fast frigate, at the Straits of Gibraltar,
Strez said.
The escort accompanies her through the Mediterranean, through the Suez Canal,
the Red Sea, the Arabian Sea and finally into the Persian Gulf.
The most recent voyage was uneventful, crewmembers said. “On a day-to-day
basis, I felt very safe,” said Becker. “In fact, this trip was really
enjoyable.
“One of the reasons that I shipped was to see the world,” she said.
“I get paid to sail. I love it.”
Becker’s only complaint was that she saw almost nothing of Kuwait. Ships
were lined up in the Gulf, waiting to pull into the dock. “We waited almost
a week to discharge our cargo,” she said.
Once the ship got to the dock, there was no time to sightsee. “I saw
the dock for about 12 hours,” she said. “The crew was allowed off
the ship only to check lines and shafts. We were busy anyway. We worked long
hours, offloading cargo.”
In Kuwait, the Seay picked up a contingent of “Guardian Mariners”—12
members from Bravo Company, 1st Battalion, 65th Infantry, 92nd Separate Infantry
Brigade, Puerto Rico National Guard.
Guardian Mariners have been assigned to beef up force protection for all MSC
ships sailing to and from Southwest Asia. “All of our ships are non-combatants,”
said Cook. “The crews are trained to use small arms the M-14 rifle, 9
mm pistol and 12-gauge shotgun.”
The Guardian Mariners can operate heavier weapons, such as the .50 machine
gun, and they are schooled in chemical, biological and radiological defense.
During the long journey back to the United States, the Seay’s crew devoted
its attention to giving the ship an intensive cleaning, Strez said.
The cargo of tanks, Bradleys, humvees and helicopters, which had been delivered
to Kuwait, had left behind gallons of leaked crank case oil, grease “all
kinds of gunk,” he said.
“We had to scrub down everything. It was very hard. You’re talking
about a ship that is almost the length and breadth of an aircraft carrier.”
Doing the cleaning cost about $10,000 in overtime, Cook said. “But if
we did it in port, it could cost up to $100,000.”
Keeping the ship clean is more than just a job, Strez said. It is a matter
of national pride. “We take it very seriously,” he said. That is
not the case with many foreign-flag vessels, he said.
Because of its huge size and small crew, the Seay is able to offer creature
comforts once unavailable to ordinary sailors. Each crewmember, for example,
gets his or her own stateroom. Also, crewmembers can watch live television shows,
broadcast via satellite from the United States.
After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, however, the crew of the Seay
and other MSC mariners are finding themselves under tighter security scrutiny.
The U.S. Coast Guard has begun fingerprinting all mariners seeking to renew
their documentation.
The service also has begun conducting its own background checks, in addition
to the investigations being performed by the Defense Department.
The Coast Guard is finding that some mariners are providing information that
conflicts with what they told the Defense Department.