walked underneath 2 Aegis destroyers

I got to visit Bath Iron Works today. School field trip. They gave us a tour of the facility, they're currently about ready to launch two aegis class destroyers (one of which is the Stockdale, didn't know the other one's name, but it's the same class). We got a tour of the indoor facilities, which was pretty sweet. They've upgraded their indoor-building capabilities from 'mega' size to 'ultra' size (this is what they call it), subsequently there's the entire deck housing for one of the destroyers just sitting in a hangar-type building. Somehow they manage to move this damn thing outside and put it onto the ship...I guess that's what the big ass cranes were for. Unpainted it looks kind of like a giant playground.

Anyway, yeah, it was cool. I wanted to take pictures but they wouldn't let us take cameras inside. Poopheads.

Oh yeah, as the title said, I got to walk underneath the ships. They build the ships on level ground now and move it to the drydock where it floods and the ship goes underway, rather than the ships having to be build in that silly incline thing that the boat gets released from.

They employ a lot of nerdy naval architects that develop computer models for finite element analysis, computational fluid dynamics, stability calculations, junk like that. I'm thinking about trying to get an internship for them after I do my cadet shipping...actually put my programming skills to some sweet commercial use.


i enjoy boats

Sweet. I love ships myself and also enjoy working with large manufacturing processes and products.

Good luck on getting an internship. And if you do you are so not my friend anymore. ;) I'd be green with envy till the end of time.

I want a destroyer for my birthday.

well the internship is still a few years away. I have to complete 2 training cruises at school on our ship and cadet shipping where I slave away as a cadet on a merchant vessel for almost no pay. There is always a student that manages to get a kick-ass billet for cadet shipping though...one guy last year worked for trans-ocean (drilling) and made friggin $27,000 over the summer!!! That's a year of school paid off before even graduating!

You could probably get a job doing something similar. Even if you don't have a degree there are plenty of people that do the modeling stuff without an engineering degree (but I thought you were going for a mech. eng. degree or something?)

This is the shipyard that is designing and will be responsible for building the latest series of navy combat vessels, the DDG 1000 and LCS 2

http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/...Concept_lg.jpg

http://www.defense-update.com/produc...dependence.htm

It's too bad they don't build battleships anymore. Actually, maybe it's a good thing. ;)

Here in Portland the ships come in each year during the Rose Festival in May. I haven't gone out to see them in several years (my allergies are at their WORST during that period of time) but I think I might this year.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Bubba with mod powers

Good luck on getting an internship. And if you do you are so not my friend anymore. I'd be green with envy till the end of time.

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Don't worry Bubba, YOU HAVE MOD POWERS!!! Mmwwhhuuhhuuhhaa!!! ;)

It's a shame you didn't ask whether they'd improved their ability to take out those pesky Kirovs... ;)

lol, yeah, that's a shame.

So you would intern on a ship? You would be a shipintern? You would have an internship as a shipintern?

Don't mind me, I'm enjoying myself here...

Actually, I'm glad you asked, because the school I go to would provide me with some advantages that most students would not have. A typical university student would be able to go into the design department, or something of that nature (office work). I'd have a Coast Guard license upon graduation, allowing me to work as a licensed shipboard engineer. Subsequently, I'd be qualified to both design ships and go onboard during the testing phase of the ship to check the systems during the shakedown.