Defense Ministry spokesman Won Tae-jae told reporters that divers could not go down to the wreckage of the Cheonan due to the prospect of rain, high winds and a swift current.

Parts of the ship remained moored in the rough Yellow Sea near Baengnyeong Island, just south of the two Koreas’ maritime border.

Divers managed to get down to the section where sailors are believed trapped but heard no signs of life inside, the Joint Chiefs of Staff said. They attempted to get into a door in the stern yesterday but made little headway, Rear Adm. Lee Ki-sik said.

Also yesterday, a 53-year-old diver who lost consciousness during a rescue attempt died and another was treated for injuries.

The sailors’ families gathered at a naval base south of Seoul cried and yelled as they demanded that authorities step up the search operation.

An explosion ripped the 1,200-ton ship apart Friday night during a routine patrol, officials said. Fifty-eight crew members, including the captain, were rescued.

Via: zeenews.com

Via: nytimes.com

Search and rescue efforts were under way, the U.S. Navy said in a statement. Three crew members were rescued.

The E-2C Hawkeye, which is primarily used to detect incoming aircraft with its 24-foot diameter radar, crashed in the North Arabian Sea after the it “experienced mechanical malfunctions,” the statement said.

The plane was used for command and control functions and operated from the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Helping in the search for the missing crew member were the Eisenhower and several of its aircraft, helicopters from guided missile destroyer USS Carney and a replenishment ship.

The Navy is investigating.

The E-2 Hawkeye is a twin engine and turboprop plane that can carry up to five crew members.

The Hawkeye provides all-weather airborne early warning, in addition to surface surveillance, combat coordination and search and rescue operations.

The aircraft uses computerized radar and electronic surveillance sensors to provide early warning and to identify potentially hostile air and surface targets.

Via: localnews8.com

The combined maximum dollar value includes a base period and four option years.

The contracts are for wet utilities construction at federal sites primarily within the Naval Facilities Engineering Command. Those sites are in Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and Utah.

Projects vary and may include water, steam, sewer, and storm sewer lines, and wells, mains, pumping stations, treatment plants and storage tanks and facilities.

The other winning bidders are RQ/FILANC I, JV of Carlsbad, Calif.; EPC Corp. of Glendale, Ariz.; Hal Hays Construction Inc. of Riverside, Calif.; Reyes Construction Inc. of Pomona, Calif.; Orion Construction Corp. of Vista, Calif.; and Tetra Tech/Pascal & Ludwig JV of Irvine, Calif.

The projects are expected to be completed by March 2015.

The Naval Facilities Engineering Command Southwest in San Diego is the contracting agency.

Via: bizjournals.com

Chief Petty Officer Adam Lee Brown, 36, a decorated combat veteran, was fatally wounded during a battle with heavily armed militants, according to a statement Friday from Naval Special Warfare Group 2 at Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek-Fort Story.

He was a recipient of the Bronze Star and Purple Heart.

“Adam Brown was a brave American patriot and fantastic Navy SEAL,” the Navy statement said. “We are deeply saddened by this tremendous loss of a fellow brother in arms and teammate.”

Brown, a native of Hot Springs, Ark., joined the Navy in 1998. He had been assigned to various East Coast SEAL teams since April 2001 and was deployed in combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. He was a graduate of Lake Hamilton High School in Pearcy, Ark., and attended Arkansas Tech University, where he played football.

He is survived by his wife and two children, who live in Virginia Beach, and his parents.

A funeral service will be held Wednesday at Hot Springs Baptist Church. There will be a private service in Hampton Roads.

Via: hamptonroads.com

Petty Officer 1st Class Julio Huertas of Blue Island is accused of mistreating Ahmed Hashim Abed, the alleged mastermind behind a 2004 ambush and murder of four American security contractors whose bodies were burned. Two of the victims were hung on a bridge over the Euphrates River. The SEALS captured Abed in September.

Special Warfare Operators 2nd Class Matthew McCabe and Jonathan Keefe have been charged along with Huertas. McCabe is accused of punching Abed, and all three were charged with dereliction of duty for failing to safeguard the detainee.

Rather than accept a reprimand, the sailors chose to fight the charges in a military court, the Associated Press reports. Since the charges were filed, many lawmakers came forward defending the sailors. Palin’s Facebook note was the latest:

“First the Obama Administration opened up the possibility of prosecuting CIA interrogators doing their jobs seeking information from terrorists,” Palin wrote. “Then they tried to go after the Bush Administration lawyers who acted in good faith to protect us in the months after 9/11. Now some of the military brass are court-martialing three brave Navy SEALs for allegedly throwing a single punch at Iraqi terrorist leader Ahmed Hashim Abed. This is wrong. The Washington Times got it right: Save the SEALs.”

In December, Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif, circulated a letter in the House calling the charges against the SEALS “an overreaction by the command,” AP reported in December.

Hunter told the AP the men could lose their rank, spend one year in confinement, get a bad conduct discharge and forfeit a portion of their pay for up to a year if the charges are not dropped.

Via: huffingtonpost.com

The Navy, seeking to beef up the ranks of its special operations force, commissioned a $500,000 Gallup study last fall to determine who might be the best candidates to become future US Navy SEALs. Topping the list were water polo players.

It turns out that a person who spends hours a day swimming up and down a pool battling for control of a ball has about twice as good a chance of passing the Navy’s rigorous SEAL training program as other people do.

If a water polo player also happens to be a pretty good chess player, his odds of making it through training triple.

The Navy SEALs are widely regarded as among the toughest and smartest members of the military. The Navy has struggled in recent years to meet the unit’s increased recruiting goals, leading to the study.

Others who have a leg up when it comes to making it into the elite force that operates in the sea, the air and on land include triathletes, boxers, lacrosse and rugby players, and swimmers and wrestlers. Still others are skiers, snowboarders, mountain bikers, rock climbers and those who practice the martial arts.

SEAL recruiters are now targeting high school and college athletes from such programs.

In Southern California, the Coronado-based Naval Special Warfare Recruiting Directorate has established ties with University High School in San Diego and Del Norte High in nearby Poway. Water polo players from the latter school recently attended a Navy SEAL fitness challenge, where they did exercised under the direction of combat-veteran SEALs.

Among them was Cole Rogers, a star water polo player at Del Norte. The 15-year-old, who also plays on an Olympic water polo development team, came away impressed.

He was considering going into the Air Force but said he’s thinking about the SEALs now as well.

It’s good news for the SEALs, who like other military branches have been trying to increase their ranks by about 15 percent or about 500 members. Curtis said the expectation now is that the goal will be achieved by 2013.

Via: navytimes.com

Home minister P Chidambaram, however, said on Wednesday that there is no threat at all to the Indian coast. He said that information had been received from fishermen that a boat with the name ‘Al Salam’ and bearing a certain registration number had been spotted.

Fishermen in Diu had informed security agencies on Monday that they had seen a white boat with ‘Al-Salam’ written on it near Diu coast. There were five persons on board who were asking for directions from them, they claimed. Suggesting that name and registration number could be fake, Chidambaram said real name and registration number has been traced.

“A massive search is on. Neither the Navy nor the Coast Guard has been able to identify the boat. Coastal security has been alerted,” he said. Seeking to allay any fears, he said: “This boat poses no threat to the coast… Everybody has been put on alert.”

He said it needed to be ascertained as to what the fishermen had seen. The authorities are taking no chances considering the fact that 10 Pakistanis, who attacked Mumbai on November 26, 2008, had used a boat to reach there from Karachi.

Via: timesofindia.indiatimes.com

The deployment was the largest in the Red Cross’ recent history, according an ARC spokesperson.

Air Force personnel at Homestead Air Reserve Base, Fla., processed the volunteers, palletized their cargo and loaded them and their cargo onto two awaiting Navy C-9 Skytrain aircraft for transportation to the Port-au-Prince airport.

In Haiti, the volunteers will work as translators aboard the USNS Comfort, a medical treatment facility for acute medical and surgical care supported by Marines, Sailors, Airmen and Soldiers.

More than 1,200 people volunteered to work with the Red Cross and the military supporting Operation Unified Response. After extensive background checks, the Red Cross chose 69 volunteers from seven states. Five Red Cross staffers are accompanying them for the month-long trip.

In preparation for the deployment, volunteers attended a Red Cross orientation, a class on international humanitarian law, and a course on military culture and etiquette, said Dee Swanier, ARC senior director of service delivery.

The volunteers will work as translators for medical patients receiving medical treatment and the medical staff providing the treatment.

Mr. Marcias added that most of the volunteers have a personal stake in the relief effort.

Golene Louis, an ARC volunteer, left Haiti in 1991 when she was 15 to live with her father in the U.S. While she and her immediate family live in the U.S., the majority of her extended family lives in Haiti.

With the exception of one cousin, her family is accounted for, she said. The Boynton Beach, Fla., resident said she hopes her cousin will be found.

While she’s never volunteered for a relief effort of this magnitude, she’s prepared for the reality of what she may face. “I expect to see wounded people and devastated people, I’m preparing myself mentally to be able to be there to support them and help them.”

No matter what the scenario, she’s prepared to help the military treat the earthquake victims.

More than 20,000 military service members, including Ms. Louis’ cousin in the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division, are supporting Operation Unified Response.

I feel the response from all the nations providing assistance is impressive, she said. “I am just so humbled and I want to tell everyone that I appreciate the fact that they’re doing that and I’m willing to work with them.”

Marc Henry Stelien, a former Army Soldier who still has family in Haiti, feels his military training along with his knowledge of the language will greatly help the relief effort.

Mr. Stelien, who recently returned from a deployment to Iraq as an Army Scout, has seen casualties in a combat environment.

Along with Ms. Louis, Mr. Stelien is grateful for the military’s efforts.

As of Jan. 21, the United States has delivered 1.4 million bottles of water, 700,000 meals and 22,000 pounds of medical equipment, which are being disbursed among some 100 distribution sites, according to Air Force Gen. Douglas Fraser, the commander of U.S. Southern Command.

Off the Haitian coast are 20 U.S. ships, with the floating hospital vessel USNS Comfort among them, adding medical capabilities and supplying about 600 medical personnel and 1,000 desperately needed hospital beds. As of Jan. 20, roughly 270 U.S. medical personnel on the ground had treated more than 5,100 people in Haiti.

Source: af.mil

BAIE DEGRAND GOAVE, Haiti (Jan. 20, 2010) Medical staff aboard the multi-purpose amphibious assault ship USS Bataan treat an injured patient during a mass causality environment. The child was one of 19 Haitians brought aboard Bataan during a mass medical evacuation from various areas around Port-au-Prince. Bataan, along with amphibious dock landing ships USS Fort McHenry, USS Gunston Hall and USS Carter Hall are participating in Operation Unified Response and are providing military support capabilities to civil authorities to help stabilize and improve the situation in Haiti in the wake of the 7.0 magnitude earthquake on Jan. 12, 2010.

BAIE DE GRAND GOAVE, Haiti (Jan. 20, 2010) Members of a Haiti village hold up a United States flag during a reconnaissance flight to assess the damage from the 6.1 magnitude aftershock. The multi-purpose amphibious assault ship USS Bataan is participating in Operation Unified Response and are providing military support capabilities to civil authorities to help stabilize and improve the situation in Haiti in the wake of the 7.0 magnitude earthquake on Jan. 12, 2010.

LEOGANE, Haiti (Jan. 20, 2010) Marines assigned to the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit , embarked aboard the multipurpose amphibious assault ship USS Bataan , unload bottled water from a CH-53E Sea Stallion helicopter to distribute to the local Haitian population. Bataan, along with amphibious dock landing ships USS Fort McHenry, USS Gunston Hall and USS Carter Hall are participating in Operation Unified Response and are providing military support capabilities to civil authorities to help stabilize and improve the situation in Haiti in the wake of the 7.0 magnitude earthquake on Jan. 12, 2010.

BAIE DE GRAND GOAVE, Haiti (Jan. 20, 2010) The multipurpose amphibious assault ship USS Bataan transits off the coast of Haiti while conducting flight operations supporting relief efforts on the ground. Bataan, along with amphibious dock landing ships USS Fort McHenry, USS Gunston Hall and USS Carter Hall are participating in Operation Unified Response and are providing military support capabilities to civil authorities to help stabilize and improve the situation in Haiti in the wake of the 7.0 magnitude earthquake on Jan. 12, 2010.

Source: bataan.navy.mil