Monday, June 1, 2015

Nothing but blue water.



News from the ship's librarian, Laurel:

 5/31

Hi from the Atlantic, where there’s nothing but blue water all around us and an occasional passing freighter.

The students are extremely focused on homework this week and seem to be hitting the books very hard! I’ve also heard a fair bit of moaning lately, particularly over problems to do with celestial navigation and related to the machinery we use regularly aboard the ship. (A question received from a cadet today: “what’s up with the incinerator?”) Pressing issues such as these keep me pretty busy hunting for the right books and resources to answer these all-important questions.

During one recent break from the frenzied pace; however, I did get to stop in to a class geared towards the upper-level 1st class cadets. Taught by Navy Petty Officer and Hospital Corpsman Alvarado, the course focuses on all things to do with health and medicine at sea, such as how to assist in emergency situations while ensuring your own safety, how to prevent burns and hypothermia, as well as a little about toxicology, and CPR.

During the class, the students broke off into pairs to learn how take each others' blood pressure and pulse.  Look out for pictures from the training session after the 7th when we are scheduled to arrive in Italy!


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