I am a retired Data Processor First Class (DP1), who served from 1975 -1995, and had the honor of serving aboard two of the best carriers in the Navy. My first was the USS Ranger and my last was the USS Nimitz.

Going into the Navy right out of high school from Chicago, where had become used to tall buildings, did not prepare me for the sight of my first ship in the Navy’s aircraft carrier inventory. The USS Ranger was like a UFO to me, and I guess I was scared to go aboard until one of the guys who was in boot camp with me said, “Close your mouth — you’re drooling.” This was my start to a wonderful career in the carrier fleet.

Dennis L. McCoy
CSC IT Support
China Lake, CA

I joined the Navy in 1969, not so much as a patriotic duty but as a response to a letter received from the Selective Service board. Back then my sole goal in life was to become the next Wolfman Jack on the radio. I had taught myself electronics and was well on the way to qualifying as a broadcast engineer at the local station. So I viewed four years of Naval service as a minor delay to fame and fortune.

An A6 Intruder returns from a strike mission in Vietnam.

The Navy made me an Aviation Fire Control Technician, fixing radar systems on Phantoms, Tomcats, Intruders and Hornets. My first cruise in 1972 was aboard USS America with VF-74. The only memory that stands out from that nearly year long Vietnam cruise was endlessly dragging 100 pounds of test equipment through blinding monsoon rains in order to get the birds ready for the next alpha strike.

The age of Top 40 radio was over by the time we got back in 1973, so I decided to hang out for awhile. Cruises on Enterprise, Ranger, Kitty Hawk and finally Nimitz followed. The years went by in a blur with many warm memories, and some not so warm. The fall of Saigon in ‘75, 121 straight days at sea, becoming the fastest sailor on deck while avoiding fast moving flaming debris, all conflict with tropical ports of call, camaraderie of friends, and doing what it takes to get the job done.

What began as a tour of four years has now grown to nearly forty years of devotion to the Navy. Since shedding my uniform in 1994, I’ve repaired Hornet hydraulics at Top Gun, rewired Tomcats at a depot, built test equipment for carriers, and sailed with the Sealift Command. Today’s job, to me, is the most important of all. Each day hundreds of young men and women gather in the classrooms I maintain. My goal is to prepare them to excel on the same decks I once traveled. The simple act of repairing a computer takes on new importance when viewed from a historical perspective.

Darrell Buxton
CSC Systems Administrator
TSC Hampton Roads, CNATTU Oceana

I spent a six-month deployment in the Indian Ocean onboard the USS Enterprise (CVN-65), working as an Aviation Structural Mechanic for Fighter Squadron 213 (VF-213) – “The Black Lions” - attached to Carrier Air Wing 11 (CVW-11).

It was my first deployment, so I spent the first three months ‘seconded’ to work on the aft mess decks. I remember spending 12-hour shifts scrubbing pans, seven days a week, and wondering what the heck I had got myself into. Once my time washing dishes was through, I was assigned to Corrosion Control. My job was to work with a team of three other guys to inspect each of the twelve F-14 Tomcats for corrosion damage, and then repair it in an appropriate manner. We were out at sea (obviously) so this was a full time job with all of the exposure to salt air. In addition, we weren’t allowed to paint the entire plane, so we only painted those areas where we have completed repairs. This gave the aircraft a rather leprous appearance, quite different from the nice clean planes everyone saw in “Top Gun.”

The deployment was part of Operation Earnest Will, escorting reflagged Kuwaiti oil tankers in the Persian Gulf. The Enterprise battle group also participated in Operation Praying Mantis, which struck against Iranian surface and air units in retaliation for Iranian mining of international waters.

During the six month deployment, we made port calls in the Philippines, Hong Kong, Pusan, and Mombasa.

Ellis Williams
Chief Technology Officer (Motorola)
CSC Global Infrastructure Services
Americas Architecture & Innovation

I served as the Reactor Training Assistant on USS Nimitz from May 1999 to December 2000 and was responsible for administering the training program for the 400+ nuclear-trained personnel onboard. This task was especially difficult since the ship was undergoing a nuclear refueling overhaul in Newport News Shipyard at the time. My main mission was to prepare the reactor department personnel for the reactor safeguards examination following the refueling, a necessary milestone prior to bringing the reactors critical again. The crew was able to do this through a complex mix of training lectures, drills, oral and written exams, practical applications, and cross decking with other operational carriers.

I’m sure the ship looks nothing like it did while I was onboard. When I reported in May of 1999, the ship was in dry dock and most of the spaces were stripped down for refurbishment. Traversing the ship was made especially difficult because of the numerous hoses and ventilation trunks that passed through all the passageways, transoms, and watertight hatches. All services such as medical, berthing, and dining were provided by a barge located next to the ship. When the ship left the dry-dock and went pierside for steam testing, as the reactor duty officer, I was one of the few duty personnel not allowed to leave the ship, which included not being able to sleep or eat on the barge which remained in the dry dock at the end of the pier. There were only a couple of staterooms on the ship that were still habitable, and that’s putting it nicely. There were a few duty nights where I had to scrounge around looking for a rack that had a mattress. And the temporary showers and heads that were rigged up for us few souls stuck on the ship were seldom hot and seldom clean.

I left active duty following this tour and never was able to see the ship operational. But I was proud when Nimitz returned to the fleet again following her overhaul, knowing I had a small hand in ensuring she met her operational commitments and was ready for the global war on terrorism following the events of 9/11. I’m now a commander in the Navy Reserves, supporting the Naval Network Warfare Command, but at heart, I’ll always be a “surface nuke.”

Robert Carlisle
CSC Program Management Principal Leader

My six years of Navy life began in 1967. After a year of shore duty at Pearl Harbor, I volunteered for the Navy nuclear power program and submarine training. After a year of electronic schools in San Diego and San Francisco, six months of basic nuclear power school at Mare Island, there was a gap of several months before nuclear prototype school began in Idaho. During this time, I was temporarily assigned to the aircraft carrier USS Ranger which was in the yards at Hunters Point in San Francisco.

After a couple of weeks on the Ranger, two other electronic technicians and I were summoned to the meet with the officer in charge of our group on the Ranger and were notified that we had been ‘volunteered’ to go on temporary assignment to the USS Hornet, an aircraft carrier which just pulled into Long Beach after a Vietnam deployment. In the month of June, 1969 we were flown to Long Beach and reported aboard the Hornet which soon departed for Pearl Harbor. We spent several days in Hawaii loading civilian reporters, television satellite and NASA equipment. After departing for some place in the south Pacific, one of the volunteers from the Ranger and I were summoned to the electronic officer’s quarters where we were told that we had been ‘volunteered’ to report to two civilians in a satellite communications hut on the Hornet flight deck. The civilians were engineers from the Naval Electronics Laboratory Center in San Diego. The engineers had built a satellite communication center used for the Apollo recoveries that provided communication between the recovery vessel, Hawaii and Houston. My shipmate and I were trained by the engineers to man the communication center at night while they slept. On July 24, 1969, Apollo 11 made splashdown. Since President Nixon was flown to the Hornet for the recovery, all non-flight related personnel had to remain below decks for the recovery but the civilian engineers requested that my shipmate and I be on the flight deck to assist them in the communication hut. We were one of the few on board the Hornet that were able to witness the recovery of the astronauts and space capsule from the vantage of the Hornet flight deck.

After completing nuclear prototype school in Idaho, I reported to a new construction submarine at Mare Island, the USS Hawkbill. After sea trials we reported to our home base in San Diego where we were one of the first submarines to perform initial testing with the Deep Submergence Rescue Vehicle (DSRV) off of San Diego. I spent the remaining two years of my enlistment on the Hawkbill.

I don’t know of any other opportunities that a young man or woman could have to serve our country, gain a technical education, a chance to witness and be a part of history, have the responsibilities of running and maintaining complex equipment both on the sea and below the sea, all by the age of 24. This has always been a meaningful part of my life.