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USS Emory S. Land Visits Rota, Repairs Small Watercraft

Navy NewsStand

Story Number: NNS050131-08
Release Date: 2/1/2005 6:11:00 AM

By Photographer's Mate 2nd Class (AW) Timothy Comerford, Naval Station Rota, Spain, Public Affairs

ROTA, Spain (NNS) -- The submarine tender USS Emory S. Land (AS 39) pulled into Rota, Spain, Jan. 19 to repair some of the small boats that belong to Naval Station Rota's Port Operations Department before continuing its mission to the Gulf of Guinea to support the navies of West Africa and build relationships with those countries.

A full service tender, Emory S. Land is capable of repairing and servicing almost any type of ship, but the repair of Port Operations' craft is a new mission for the crew, and one that they welcome.

"This is something that we have always wanted to do," said Capt. Mike Budney, commanding officer of Emory S. Land. "The watercraft in the port belong to the shore facility and we are funded to fix boats at sea, but one of the great things we have done at La Maddalena is transitioning by having the squadron commodore and the shore facility captain put those funds into one job. We figured out how to move that money around so that we are able to fix shore-based watercraft. We had a tremendous capacity that we were not able to fully utilize and now we can do it."

"Every ship that pulls into Rota relies upon the various craft to make their docking, to get underway and haul material to and from the ships," said Cmdr. Brian McGinnis, the ship's repair officer. "Working for Port Operations here is just a continuation of our current mission."

The repair officer and commanding officer both see this as a way the Navy is becoming trimmer and more efficient.

"Expanding our customer base vice only targeting submarines, as we have in the past, helps us transform 6th Fleet to make it leaner and better utilize our resources," said McGinnis. "It is the right thing to do and will allow us to provide better services to everybody while increasing the amount of people we provide service to."

Land also helps in the U.S. 5th and 6th Fleet areas of responsibility (AOR) by sending their personnel abroad.

"We fly our personnel with their gear to ports all over the world, CENTCOM [Central Command] AOR, the U.K. - we can really go anywhere," said Budney. "We sent 14 hull technicians to Kuwait to help armor Army vehicles. We still retain enough welders for what we have to do."

The commanding officer of Land sees this as a great opportunity.

"I have a great crew and we are excited about this opportunity to do something that we have never done before," Budney explained. "We have never operated in this part of the world before. The ship, in general, over the last several years has always been focused on fixing other ships by doing a lot of it from our homeport in La Maddalena. This chance to branch out and do new things is pretty exciting for us."

Land is currently on deployment, transiting to West Africa. While deployed, the crew will participate in security training and maritime operations. Participants and observers in this year's deployment include the governments of Nigeria, Gabon, Ghana, Cameroon, Togo, Benin, Sao Tome and Principe.