Posted on 03/10/2003 4:06:56 AM PST by kattracks
ABOARD USS ABRAHAM LINCOLN (Reuters) - If you want to know all about humour, heartbreak and hubris on a U.S. aircraft carrier: read the T-shirts.
The hottest fashion item aboard the Abraham Lincoln is a T-shirt with a U-turn sign and the catch-phrase "Get over it", urging the carrier's 5,500 sailors to bury the disappointment they felt when their homebound journey was interrupted with an order to return to the Gulf as part of U.S. pressure on Iraq.
After around eight months at sea, stress is building and humour is one way to defuse it. Each squadron aboard has a range of T-shirts and patches designed by its more creative members. Some are serious, some less so.
"There's one (T-shirt) now that shows Lincoln behind bars, like a prison. It's just a way of complaining I guess," said Lieutenant Chris Jason from Sarasota, Florida, an electronic counter measures officer who flies in the "Cougars" EA-6B Prowler squadron on the Lincoln.
An aviator's jacket will often sport more than a dozen patches that give a history of where he has been. "The jacket says that guy is experienced, that guy is brand new. You can tell who's done what," Jason said.
One of the patches currently in vogue shows the twin towers of New York's World Trade Center behind a suit of armour and a sword, while another is in the form of a police badge with the logo "Anti-terrorism division". A third says "Elimination of evil tour 2002" over maps of Afghanistan and Iraq.
COLOUR CODED
Even without the variety of civilian attire, uniforms on an aircraft carrier are far from uniform. Many of the crew sport a range of coloured shirts according to their job description.
Commander Paul Erickson, the "handler" who is in charge of everything that moves on the flight deck, is at the top of the tree, wearing yellow. "Yellow is basically anybody who takes direct control of an aeroplane," he said. That includes the "shooter" who stands in front of the plane and gives the signal to launch.
Purple shirts are for the "grapes", the sailors in charge of aviation fuel, while blue is for plane handlers who move planes around under the direction of the yellows. Brown shirts are often the youngest members of the air wing but as plane captains they are responsible for making sure everything is in order with their particular aircraft.
Red is for ordnance and fire fighters. "For red, the basic way to think about it is anything that's going to blow up," said Erickson, who is from Oak Harbour, Washington.
Perhaps the most uncomfortable outfit is worn by the firefighters on standby during flight operations. They wear around 30 pounds of gear including heat reflective foil suits, boots, fire-proof gloves and helmets in addition to a buoyancy vest in case they go overboard.
"When I get out of my suit I'm drenched in sweat from head to toe," said Nathan Sotello, 19, from Midland, Texas. He and the others who stand two-hour shifts on the flight deck are beginning to feel the heat building up with the arrival of spring and by summer they will be working in temperatures of over 120 degrees.
What, is this Reuters author from the 1920s? English is a second language?
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 Green shirts hook the planes to catapults, handle arresting (stopping) wire, and perform aircraft maintenance. |
 White shirts handle safety-related jobs, including final inspections of aircraft before they take off. |
 Blue shirts chain planes into position, put chocks under the wheels so the planes don't roll around, drive tractors that pull the airplanes, and operate elevators to get the planes on the flight deck. |
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