The Training Ship Empire State is moored port side to receiving various (few) services from the pier. The Regiment of Cadets and the staff are completing pre underway check off lists and final load out. The weather is cooperating nicely; skies are overcast, temperature is 45 degrees, winds are from the west at 15 knots, seawater injection temperature is 38 degrees Fahrenheit. The unexpectedly mild weather is an added advantage. People can work more quickly when the brow and adjacent pier are free of annoying, slippery ice. We will take any help that is offered and divine intervention is always most welcomed.

CAPTAIN'S LOG

"The will to win is worthless if you do not have the will to prepare." -Thane Yost

Preparations for our Saturday afternoon departure are progressing very nicely. Cadet leadership have adapted well to the overwhelming demands placed so suddenly upon them. Few fully understood the demands that leadership brings. Responsibility and accountability for the many less experienced among them is well understood now. Imagine, when freshmen cadets reported aboard last Sunday they walked into the three-dimensional steel maze of ladderwells, passageways, and compartments that we call Training Ship Empire State and were quickly and predictably lost. Cadet Leaders began with shipboard basic survival, i.e. this is where, when, and how we eat, and evolved necessary skill sets from there. They have been remarkably successful. One rarely sees the trails of breadcrumbs, popcorn, or string that earlier littered the passageways and pointed the way to the center of all life itself, the mess hall.

The Cadet engineers have been especially busy. Since our pier is under construction, shore power is unavailable so the ship's power plant has been up and running throughout. Today, the cadets have the ship's service turbine generators on line with the electric plant split, half the electrical load on the port machine, and half on starboard. That way the ship can only go half dark.

In addition to keeping the lights burning, the snipes have been efficiently repairing the myriad deficiencies that occur whenever a ship sits idly by the pier for several months. My stateroom thermostat is on the fix list. It thinks that we are in Siberia and it dutifully raised the temperature to that which one would find on the equator in mid summer. I hope that it finds itself before we arrive in Vera Cruz.

The Deck Cadets are busy too. Most have marked their charts and checked them twice but each has learned that voyage planning takes on a decidedly different flavor here in the light of the real world... miles removed from the comfort of the Harrington Building Navigation Lab. They are also sweating preparations for the United States Coast Guard Inspectors who will march aboard tomorrow and put us through the paces. Never a dull moment in a world full of young people trying to find where they are and figure where they are going.

The event of the day however, starts shortly. Controlled chaos for the first time then, slowly moving forward toward precision...the general alarm sounding,the ships whistle blaring, people hurrying forward to port, aft to starboard, off to boat stations, taking muster, testing equipment, developing needed confidence, preparing for sea. And there it is, the ship's whistle...Let the Fire and Boat Drills begin!

See you tomorrow... after we impress the Coast Guard.