I joined the Navy in 1983. I had enough credits to skip the last half of my senior year. so I went to boot camp at the great "mistakes" training center in North Chicago.
I went to boot camp right after the marine corps barracks in Beirut was blown up. In boot camp their scare tactic was that if we screwed up. they would not give us our Class A school we were promised. but they would send us directly to beirut, we would not pass Go and would not collect 200 dollars.
After bootcamp. I remained at great lakes and attended hospital corps school. following in my fathers footsteps. After this I went to Camp Johnson NC to train as a field medical service technician for the United States marines.
Another interesting fact is the fact that President Reagan wanted a 600 Ship Navy to help win the cold war. Hence I was in the largest Boot camp and Field medical service school. since the Vietnam war. Sadly this would later come to bite many of us, as Congress turned him don, which made almost every MOS in the navy well overmanned, and pretty much dropped advancement to a halt. (after 4 years I was still an E-3 and had no evidence in site that would change any time soon.
After this I was transferred to the national naval medical center in Bethesda Maryland. I did my residence on a ward. then went to train to be an orthopedic technician. I was here when President Reagan God shot. he was sent to the army hospital. But one night (as a young kid I used to party alot) I woke up and looked at the clock thinking I was late to work (it was 9:00) I hurriedly got dressed and ran out the door to run across the street. when 4 men armed with M-16s dropped me to the ground. Sadly it was 9:00 PM not am, and president Reagan had just arrived at the hospital. They landed 3 helicopters and there was a massive amount of people. you could not see which one he left or entered.. When they took off they all three went different ways (a security feature.) while there I was part of a rapid response team. One week i was home halfway across a country. My team went to Granada to help rescue all the students who were trapped there. God must have protected me and did not want me to go for some reason. But when I got back, Both my room mates went. Lets just say what they told us in the news and what really happened were not even close.. and I had my first doubt of major news outlets sharing the truth (of Course I am sure the military did this.)
After this I was transferred to the US navy Air station in Corpus Christy Texas, where I worked in the Ortho General surgery clinic. My wife at the time and me were in an apartment complex not far from the base. and everyone I hung out with actually was in the US Coast Guard. In my final few months, I was told that re-enlistment was impossible because of the aforementioned overstaffing issue. However at the last minute, I was offered to remain if I would go to the second marine division in Okinawa Japan. With the fact that I was still an E-3 with no hope in sitre of advancing. My marriage was in danger (she told me if I went she would leave me) and other stuff. i decided to get out after 4 years.
Now the problem was civilian life. I had 1 child already and another on the way. No one would hire me for any medical position. stating I was overqualified. so I worked at Toys Are us making 5.00/hr.. So I decided to try to re-enlist. only this time, due to my time with my many Coast Guard friends. I went to the coast Guard.
Now the medical field in the Coast Guard was pretty much a paper pusher and maybe putting some ban aids on.. so this time I decided to go into electronics. In doing so I struck electrician on the ice breaker on the great lakes I was on. and made E-4 before my electronics school was available. so i chose to keep it (I had been in for 5 years by this time)
while in the coast gaurd. I served on an Ice Breaker in the great lakes. i traveled every great lake and I can tell you ice breaking to free these large 1000 foot freighters can be nerve racking at time. As when they break free the friend end comes up out of the water with all the power they have, and your on this 140 foot tug boat..lol
After that I was transferred to aids to navigation team in Sault Ste Marie 9Siberia) Michigan. where we took care of and maintained alol the aid to navigation While there the first Gulf war started. Since most of the US steel comes from taconite pellets that must travel though the Saint mary's river to the steel plants on Clevland and Pennsylvania. Amazingly, during the cold war, this was in the top ten of targets to get nuked.. Shut down the st married river would prety much shut down steel production in the US. Sadaam threated to sink a frieghter there. so they purchased us 2 snow mobiles and those in my group ( a small group of 5) would ride up and down the river with M-16s' looking for suspicious activinty. Sadly during this time something happened that cause me to hurt my back. Something that a few year later would lead to my medical retirement.
After this I transferred to a Medium Endurance cutter in Boston Mass. we would go down to the carrabean area and homeport in CUBA (I spent many a day at the US naval base in cuba) doing what the coast Guard does. Law enforcement (looking for Drugs, search and rescue and just patrolling off the US southern coast and Caribbean area.
other times we would patrol the northers area near Canada. On one particular cruise. i remember the navy telling everyone to seek shelter. Sadly it was end of the fishing season. so many commercial fishing vessels stayed out. Our captain decided it would be easier to sat put then come back out.
This storm was called the storm of the century. basically 3 storm systems met in the northern Atlantic and created what many call the "perfect storm" I remember we tried to turn, but in doing so. we took a roll so bad. multiple people Got injured. some seriously. So we had to ride it out. We tried to rescue one person who was seriously ill. but we could not safely launch our rescue small boat. (I remember being on deck, and the boat was lifted up by a wave about 20 feet above the deck. and landed on the deck as the wave moved on)
after about 2 weeks (no one had slept) we were on a rescue mission to find a fishing vessel which was in distress. When we finally found where we were (we were the first onsite) the weather had calmed down, and the seas were smooth. So what we say was a lot of debris from a boat which had sunk, from chucks of wood from a destroyed hull. to personal items. Moral was so low. our Captain said they people on the boat survived, a helicopter was able to rescue the people before the ship went down.
Sadly many years later they came out with a movie called perfect storm which was a movie about this storm. In the movie it showed our sister ship who was also looking, and an attempted helicopter rescue which failed. and I found it that no one survived. To this day I am unable to watch that movie.. Just thinking about it. Brings me to tears. it is as if we failed to do our jobs.
Moving on. The results of the pounding I took on this mission caused me to have severe back pain. I was finally sent to a US naval hospital in Road Island for treatment (I met an E-4 there who was in the navy for about 8 years and he was still only an E-4. So my reasoned to leave the navy was confirmed.
They found I had a herniated disc. and put me on treatment, but this pulled me off the ship. I went to the naval engineering support team (The coast guard has minimally manned crews. The same size ship in the navy would have 2 or three times the cre on the same sized ship) what they did was when they came into put. these support teams would come on board and do most of their PMS, Assist in any repairs. or upgrades.. While there. the major flee of civilians from cuba was in progress. we had many coast guard ships go down to assist. And they needed support. so I spent a few months in Key West area supporting this operation.
Unfortunately my back did not respond to treatment, and I was deemed unfit for ship duty or war service. and was medically discharged with full benefits in 1996.
wow this brought back alot of memories.. I am sure those who served in theater in Iraq or any war have far more interesting careers. and I Salute all of you for your service. mine was pretty light.. But I would not trade it in for anything.
