Destroyer Briscoe's final deployment a vivid one
By JACK DORSEY, The Virginian-Pilot
© May 10, 2003
Last updated: 5:35 PM
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| The destroyer Briscoe. File photo.
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| CORRECTION: A photograph of the Norfolk-based amphibious command ship Mount Whitney was incorrectly identified as the destroyer Briscoe on the cover of Saturday's paper and on Pilot Online. Homecomings Guide: News, message board, travel help
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For a ship headed into retirement, the destroyer Briscoe's deployment swan song was anything but quiet. ``We've had one heck of a deployment, just fantastic from start to finish,'' Cmdr. Scott Sundt, the Briscoe's captain, said from Rota, Spain, as he pointed the 25-year-old ship's bow west toward the Atlantic for its final trip home. ``We have done just about everything a ship could be asked to do. . . . It's easier to list what we didn't do.''
During the past five months at sea, the Briscoe and its crew of 370 fired Tomahawk missiles, performed missions off the Horn of Africa and bounced back and forth between the Mediterranean and Red seas.
The Briscoe, part of the carrier Truman battle group, left Norfolk Dec. 5 in advance of the war in Iraq. Along with most of the 10 other ships in the group, it is due home May 23.
``As soon as we got over here, we started doing escorts through the Strait of Gibraltar,'' Sundt said.
Gibraltar is one of several narrow choke points for warships to pass, where they are more vulnerable to attacks than on the open seas.
``Then we got orders right after Christmas to beat feet and get ourselves through the Suez Canal,'' he said. ``We did that on Jan. 5 and headed straight to the Gulf of Aden and the Horn of Africa.''
They joined a multinational task force commanded by an Italian admiral and patrolled the strait of Bab al Mandab, another choke point for shipping at the southern end of the Red Sea. There they monitored the flow of coalition forces headed to the Persian Gulf, including the seven-ship Amphibious Task Force East from Norfolk that carried more than 5,000 Hampton Roads-based sailors and 7,000 North Carolina-based Marines to the war front.
Working with the command ship Mount Whitney off the Horn of Africa, the Briscoe provided naval gunfire support off the African republic of Djibouti to help train 20 gunnery spotters from five countries.
``In eight hours we shot over 300 rounds into the range and did 32 firing missions,'' Sundt said. ``That was really impressive. I've never seen anything like that in the 28 years I've been in the Navy, and I'm a gunnery type of guy.''
Next the ship was ordered to head back into the northern Red Sea, where it joined eight other ships for the beginning of the war in mid-March.
``We launched 25 Tomahawks over the space of several days,'' he said.
Then the Briscoe was ordered back into the Suez Canal to escort other ships.
Back into the Med, the Briscoe picked up guard duty near Egypt's Port Said, helping out minesweeping ships in the area. Then it was off toward Syria, after the Briscoe received ``some information about some bad guys we thought might be trying to get out.''
The Briscoe was resupplied by ships from Germany, France, Spain, Italy and the United States.
Through all its activity, the ship's crew never suffered a significant casualty.
The Briscoe's crew includes 55 women and and some sailors who are not yet U.S. citizens, Sundt said. They come from Morocco, India, the Philippines and the Caribbean.
``What keeps getting to me is how young everyone is,'' Sundt said. ``My warfighters are 19 and 20 years old. They are not hardened, salty old sailors. These are people who have been in the Navy just one or two years, and here they are sitting in front of consoles, launching Tomahawks.''
Lt. Charles Rogers, 31, the ship's operations officer, said he also was impressed with the crew.
``I was very, very amazed how knowledgeable these kids are at such young ages,'' he said. ``In some cases they are cocky. But they get the job done.''
There is more to firing a Tomahawk than just ``ready, aim, fire,'' Rogers said. Hours of preparation are required to prevent the missiles from hitting one another, or flying over a friendly ship.
On March 21, when 400 of the 800 Tomahawks used in the war were launched, the sky was filled with bright orange flames reflecting off the various ships' decks. Rogers, a transplant from Texas who now calls Norfolk home, is married and the father of two, with a third child expected by August.
``Leading up to the point where the first missile left the rail, the crew was excited,'' Rogers said. ``But when it left the rail, it was a very silencing thing. The gravity of what that missile was on its way to do was kind of humbling.''
Petty Officer 2nd Class Christina Taylor, a boatswain's mate from Chesapeake, watched that night, too. She described the missile firings as somber, with everyone in a ``team mode'' to ``take care of business.''
``I feel good about what we did, because we did our job and did it extremely well,'' said Taylor, who is the mother of a 4-year-old son named Jerit. ``But it is time to go home.''
Reach Jack Dorsey at jdorsey@pilotonline.com or 446-2284.