information required by the ship, the ARG, and embarked Marine components. Analysts in the JIC can draw from vast databases of Defense Mapping Agency maps, satellite photography, and anything else the intelligence community provides. Even better, they can probably tell you what it means. The staff is a 'rainbow' organization from every unit involved.
• Tactical Logistics Group Center (TACLOG)—Crammed with computers, phones, and people, TACLOG controls the logistics battle. Everything from the layout of vehicles in the stowage areas to the embarkation of troops by the ship's combat cargo staff is controlled from here.
• Tactical Air Control Center (TACC)—The air traffic control center for the ship and the ARG, the TACC monitors the airspace around the ARG, and generates the daily air tasking order (ATO).
An enlisted berthing area aboard the USS Wasp (LHD-1). The bunks are stacked three-high, and are much more comfortable than those aboard nuclear submarines and older vessels. JOHN D. GRESHAM When an operation or exercise is underway, these spaces resemble a beehive without the buzz, on the job, around the clock, until it is finished.
One deck down (the 03 Level) is the LHD's medical department. One of the more chilling features of the original LHA was the provision for a large hospital facility (about 375 beds). It was almost doubled in size when the LHDs were being designed. In fact, when the Wasp is at home in Norfolk, Virginia, she is listed in the Virginia State disaster plan as the fourth-largest hospital in the state, with some 600 beds! Marines know how fast amphibious warfare can generate casualties when things go wrong. Except for the hospital ships, Mercy (T-AH-19) and Comfort (T-AH- 20), these are the most capable medical facilities afloat. In addition to a large triage area, there are six operating theaters, eighteen post- operative/intensive-care beds, 6 isolation ward beds, and 36 primary-care beds. Using berthing space from disembarked Marines allows up to 536 additional bed cases. There are also oversized radiology and dental departments.
Below the Medical Department, on the 04 Level, are maintenance shops for mechanical equipment, electronics, and hydraulic systems. Further forward are accommodations for enlisted and non-commissioned (NCO) sailors and Marines — over two thousand berths, divided into many compartments. The chiefs and Marine NCOs live in 'Goat Lockers' with about a dozen bunks (in two high racks) and recreational areas with tables and televisions. Enlisted personnel have racks stacked three-high, and you might find as many as sixty or seventy personnel in one such berthing space. While dense, the accommodations are much more comfortable than those we have seen previously on older vessels. Each sailor or Marine has an individual berth, and there is no 'hot bunking' as aboard submarines. In addition to personal stowage, Marines also have armories for their weapons and combat equipment, so that they can rapidly assemble their gear in an emergency. These berths are located just forward of the Medical Department, and can become hospital beds if necessary.
Dining facilities for NCO and enlisted personnel look just like shore-based mess halls. The food is good and the service fast. It has to be when you consider that they serve almost twelve thousand meals every day. Sharing the same food and ship has a way of bonding everyone, no matter what their rank, as 'shipmates.' Admirals and generals walk the same passageways and share the same dangers with PFCs and chiefs. It makes for a unique shipboard society. I like it. It says good things about the Navy, the Marine Corps, and America. It says that when the work starts, we all work, and we all share.
The Wasp is a virtual city-at-sea, with all the needs of a city. One of the biggest is communications, both within the ship and to 'the world.' Communications systems include FM/HF/UHF/VHF radios, UHF/VHF/EHF satellite systems, video teleconferencing, and other command and control systems. For communications around the ship, there is a phone system, as well as the ever-present public-address system known as the 1 MC. There are moves to bring the Wasp (and the Navy on the whole) into the computer network era as well. The Wasp is wired for a wide-area network (WAN) divided into departmental local-area networks (LANs). These in turn are being tied into the Navy's department-wide telecommunications system. Desktop and laptop computers are everywhere. You see young sailors in their bunks using them to tap out letters home, or officers creating briefing viewgraphs for the next landing exercise.
A ship-based cable television system broadcasts news and movies to every compartment. You see many small personal televisions (hooked to the ship's cable network), VCRs, and stereo systems used by crew and Marines for entertainment during the rare off-hours. A stabilized satellite television dish was recently fitted on the Wasp's island structure. Officially, this allows intelligence specialists to monitor CNN and other twenty-four-hour news services, but it also brings the crew news and sports from home without the delay of videocassettes. Soon, it will be standard equipment on all Navy vessels. Other amenities for the crew include a well-stocked ship's store, a post office, and an efficient laundry service. All of these features make life more livable for over 2,500 people during Wasp's six- or seven-month cruises.
A ship is nothing but a cold hulk unless it can generate power. We'll finish our tour of the Wasp in the heart of the ship — engineering and propulsion. You have to go into the very bowels of the ship, below the vehicle and cargo decks, to enter the 'land of the snipes,' the nickname for boiler and engineering technicians. Rather than the gas turbines or marine diesels that drive most modern warships, LHDs continue the tradition of oil-fired steam plants. The Wasp is powered by a pair of 2,600- PSI/41.7-kg-per-cm Combustion Engineering boilers, which generate steam for the two Westinghouse turbines, for a total of 70,000 horsepower to the twin shafts. This translates to a cruising speed of around 22 kt/40.25 kph, and a maximum speed of approximately 24 kt/43.9 kph. While it may not quite match the 30+ kt/55 kph of a supercarrier or destroyer, it is adequate for the job. With a full load of fuel, steaming at approximately 20 kt/36.6 kph, the Wasp has an unrefueled range of approximately 9,500 nm/17,600 km, which means that it can transit to most potential trouble spots with a bare minimum of support shipping.
The Wasp's vast electrical requirements are met by a series of motor generators supplying different types of power (220 V and 110 V AC, 12 V and 15 V DC, etc.). The freshwater distillation plant produces enough water for every member of the crew to take a 'Hollywood' shower every day. Distilled water is quite soft and pure, without the chlorine taste prevalent in city tap water. The 'snipes' of the Engineering Division also manage Wasp's fuel and fluid systems, including hydraulics, jet fuel, and diesel for the vehicles of the embarked Marines. They play a key role in damage control effort, since without power, Wasp would quickly succumb to damage from missiles, bombs, torpedoes, or even accidental fire. Warships are collections of combustible, flammable, and explosive stuff; all of these demand intense vigilance. Damage control is something of an obsession with Navy captains and crews. Our experience in the Persian Gulf and that of the British in the Falklands in 1982 emphasized the survival value of damage control. As noted in Submarine, the Navy has worked hard to deploy improved fire fighting systems like Aqueous Film Forming Foam (AFFF) fire extinguishers and improved emergency breathing apparatus. Everywhere on Wasp you see Day-Glo orange containers with emergency breathing masks for survival in the smoke of a fire.
Not just a packing crate for Marines and their equipment, Wasp is a platform capable of many different missions, from amphibious raids and assaults, to sea control (escorting convoys and protecting sea lanes). It is perhaps for this reason that the Wasp (LHD-1) and her sister ships, Essex (LHD-2), Kearsarge (LHD-3), and Boxer (LHD-4), have become the most sought-after ships in the Navy. When the next three LHDs, Bataan (LHD-5), Bonhomme Richard (LHD-6), and the still unnamed seventh unit of the class, join the fleet in a few years, it will give all twelve ARGs a big-deck aviation ship. The final three ships have significant improvements over the earlier LHDs. The Ex-31 RAM launchers and 25mm Bushmaster cannon mounts will be built in from the start, along with smaller superstructures, more aviation fuel capacity, and improved communications, damage control, and medical capabilities. There will also be accommodations for female personnel, under the 'Women at Sea' program (see the LPD-17 below for more on this). These features will be retrofitted to earlier units during their first major overhauls. The Wasp and her sister ships represent the core of America's forced-entry capability, and will be so for decades to come.
