Eagle updates

These are from a site the Eagle has where they periodically do updates. It's actually through Facebook and you can't access it unless you have a FB account. Don't worry, it's not OPSEC violations to be posting!

Saturday March 14th:

Tonight we welcomed aboard the current Officer Candidate School class to EAGLE for their afloat training cruise. We will be getting underway within the next few days for a short sail off the east coast of the US, introducing these future officers to life at sea. It is an exciting time for the EAGLE crew because this is the first training cruise of 2009: time to get in gear for the sailing season!

with that update there were a few pictures, but none that included Dan.

Tuesday March 17th:

Underway from Little Creek, bound for points east and eventually New London. Weather: Northeasterly winds 20 knots and seas of 5-7ft. We were able to get underway from Little Creek today with OCS class 02-09 onboard and everyone is excited to get sailing.
After a bit of rain and wind, we cleared the sea buoy and set 5 sails: the inner jib, the fore topmast staysail, the main topmast staysail, the mizzen topmast staysail and the lower mizzen sail. Does that confuse you? If so, you can get a taste of what our OCS class is dealing with.
Learning the "language of the job" is something that all Coasties must deal with, whether they will eventually work in Aviation, Afloat Operations, Response, Incident Management, or Support jobs. By stressing our future leaders' brains and cramming in as much lingo as possible, we accomplish two goals:
1) We breed better tall ship sailors. By the end of their week aboard, OCS class 02-09 will be able to virtually sail the EAGLE by themselves. As cool as that is, it's not the main reason...
2) We prepare these young men and women (who will be ensigns in a matter of weeks) to learn and adapt by the "fire hose" method. When they report to their first unit as a commissioned officer, they are going to have a very short amount of time to "get up to speed" on their job and their role in the organization. By experiencing a bit of that aboard EAGLE, we hopefully set them up for success upon graduation.
In the near future, we'll continue to operate east of the mid-Atlantic states and conduct training. The sunset tonight was beautiful...it's great to be a sailor!

Wednesday March 18th:

Underway east of Virginia motoring in search of wind. Weather: Southerly winds at 3-5 knots and clear skies. We braced our yards on a starboard tack in the hopes that the wind will fill in from the south this afternoon. Unfortunately, we are only seeing puffs of wind occasionally, but we do believe it will blow a bit stronger overnight so we can put up some canvas.
Our training program is progressing well; today some OC's learned a bit about Celestial Navigation and charting fundamentals, while others donned Fire Fighting Ensembles to learn about shipboard damage control. Everyone also takes a turn in the galley or the scullery washing dishes, because it takes a lot of work to feed 180 people!
Hopefully the wind cooperates....