On October 13th, NORTHLAND departed Portsmouth, VA for a 6 week Counter – Narcotics deployment to the Caribbean. This patrol will also be used to conduct some intense training for NORTHLAND’s crew in preparation for our upcoming Tailored Annual Cutter Training (TACT) in Little Creek, VA.

After saying all our goodbyes to our families & friends as well as welcoming aboard many new shipmates, we departed the pier enroute to Mayport Florida for some training with the Coast Guard’s Helicopter Interdiction Tactical Squadron (HITRON). After the quick transit to Mayport, we launched right into our training with HITRON to ensure we are ready to work with the Coast Guard’s armed helicopters to stop drug smuggling go-fast boats that we may encounter during our patrol. The crew learned a lot and quickly got back up to speed despite not having deployed with HITRON since June 2005.

On the short transit down, NORTHLAND did manage to squeeze in some morale for the crew. On Saturday night, the Officers gave the cooks a small break and cooked dinner. The Officers managed to cook some tasty pizza & pasta, breadsticks and cinnamon sticks with a yummy apple cobbler for dessert. Really, all they did was throw the makings on the dough and cook the pizzas! The Officers had a good time preparing and serving the food and the crew enjoyed watching them clean up afterwards!

We ended up spending a few extra days in Mayport to repair one of our generators, but we’re heading south now and looking forward to finding some drug-runners in the Caribbean.

SN Roach saying taking a break from helicopter tie downs.

The tie down crew awaiting the helicopter

ENS Alex, the Landing Signals Officer briefs the helo tie down crew

ET2 Fowler & SN Iulo tie down the HITRON helo

BM2 Ververka, ET2 Fowler, and SN Iulo are ready for the tie downs.

SN McGhee anxiously waiting for his chow (ET2 Hudson in the background)

HS1 Marin, SK1 Ball, ET1 DeoCampo, YN1 Pata & OS1 Herman enjoying a wonderful lunch onboard NORTHLAND

ENS Ferreira gives training to newly reported personnel, SN Gavisk, SN Henninger, GM3 Rios and SN Hoffman

BM2 Veverka diligently standing the GPOW watch.

SNBM Daniels standing guard at Naval Station Mayport

MK3 Green working to fix our Small Boat

LCDR Lane getting excited about the dishes on the Wardroom’s night to cook pizza

CDR Austin & ENS Hitzel serve up some tasty pizza for the crew

SN Degner & SK3 Fullmore bravely try the Wardroom’s cuisine

ENS Tillman wards off some sort of evil in the chow line as the CO looks on

CWO Legate proudly displays the fruits of his labor

LT Hartlove shows off his pizza while LT Skiles admires the finished product

ENS Kapusta, ENS Hitzel and ENS Potter in the Scullery

ENS Kapusta is happy to do the dishes!

SNFS Virag manning the Sound Powered Phones as we pull out of Mayport