Vol. 27, Issue 3 The Quarterly Newsletter of the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary District 11, Northern Region 2020Vol. |27 Issue | Issue No. 2 3 Jul – Sep 2020 Returning to Why I Joined Election the Auxiliary Results Service Page 6 Page 7 Safely - 7 - Vol. 27, Issue 3 In this Issue: From the Editor: From the District Commodore .................. - 3 - For a group of people who like to serve, the months of March, April, May, June, and July were From the Operations Training Officer ....... - 4 - pretty rough! When our period of stand down Helpful Links from Division Five ................ - 5 - began on 19 March, little did we know how long we would be in that posture. In the words of Why I Joined the Auxiliary ......................... - 6 - Commodore Kirkwood, “boating season started National and District Election Results ....... - 7 - without us” . and there were consequences to Expressing Gratitude and Appreciation ..... - 8 - that. But, thanks to the leadership of many, on many levels, we have finally able to inch back into Cooking-in-Place ....................................... - 9 - the work that drew many of us to the Auxiliary in Illusive Leadership .................................... - 10 - the first place. In this issue of Northwind, you will find articles related to our Returning to Service Paddlecraft Safety .................................... - 11 - Safely. The variety of ways we’ve been able to do Aux. Leadership Development Pgm. ...... - 12 - this is wide, some returning to missions in the field, masked and one fathom apart (I don’t know Reading-in-Place ...................................... - 13 - why everyone keeps calling it “six feet”) and The AUXOP Program ............................... - 14 - others doing their work from home; as you return to missions in whatever way you are able, recall Filing a Floatplan ..................................... - 15 - the reasons that you got into this work to begin Spotlight Question ................................... - 16 - with. Consider the lives that are helped and/or Those Who Have Crost the Bar ................ - 17 - saved by our work. Be gracious with those (including yourself) who may not be ready to Contributors to this Issue: Roger Bazeley, OTO Dustin return to duty in public just yet. Reach out to those Finkelson, Gail D. M. Giacomini, Michele Gibson, Peter Graham, COMO Mary Kirkwood, James Losi, Wade MacAdam, whose service as our District leadership is coming Doug Manifold, Alan Stanton, and Greg Schaefer to an end and those whose is starting/changing. And, remember those across our district (and Photos herein are provided by the author or by the subject, or are in the public domain or free to use. beyond) with whose partnership we undertake our work with honor, respect, devotion to duty. The Editor of Northwind is Greg Schaefer; he can be reached Peace to you, at [email protected]. The Rev. Gregory O. Schaefer NORTHWIND editor (FL 46, Redwood City) Northwind staff reserves the right to proofread and copy-edit all articles submitted, takes no responsibility and accepts no liability for damages caused by errors left in the document, cannot accept responsibility for the validity of websites that link from this publication, and cannot accept responsibility for any content submitted by any author. Articles published in Northwind must be consistent with the stated policies of the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary. - 2 - Vol. 27, Issue 3 From the District Commodore Reflecting on the past six months, and ready for the future! There is little denying that, if 2020 were a musical interested in getting us back to score, it would look like this one. It will be missions, in a low-COVID-risk remembered as one of ups and downs, way, and encourages us to disappointments stacked on disappointments, even decrease our personal risk by as the year to be forgotten. None of us used our 2020 following local guidelines, planners; there wasn’t anything to put in them. wearing masks, and District Commodore, Mary Kirkwood It’s easy to reflect on all the maintaining social distancing. We activities that didn’t occur these must extend the on-duty restrictions past 6 months: D-Train, OPTREXs, to our off-duty behavior to protect Flotilla meetings, boating safety our members and their families and to maintain operational excellence. classes, National Safe Boating Week, fellowship activities. Our air In July we rolled out Phase I of the fleet has been grounded and our Auxiliary “reconstitution” plan for boats remain tied up at docks. The D11, enabling us to return to some first weekend of October would of our most basic RBS missions, have been one of our busiest of the including Program Visits and year: the San Francisco Fleet Week. Vessel Safety Exams. In Phase II, While we can reflect on what we expect to return to most “coulda/shoulda” been (and it missions, adhering to strict risk- woulda been great!), it’s time to mitigation practices. find a way to adjust our lives to a None of us will ever forget 2020, new set of standards, to figure out how to get back to but we can’t let the last six months define who we business under a continued threat of COVID. are. The Coast Guard Auxiliary continues to be the One of the best things to come out of our stand down greatest volunteer organization in the world. While time has been the creation of online classes for our we are a crucial intersection in our organization, we members. Many of our members took advantage of need to determine what our new norm will be for the this training, gaining new knowledge, additional next year and how we can continue our important certifications, and competencies. This program will missions while staying within those norms. As we continue to be part of D11N, long after we have plan to roll out Phase II of the “reconstitution plan,” forgotten our COVID days. Thank you to our DSO- I encourage you to be as active as you feel MT, Ann Zocchi, and our incredible instructors for comfortable within our new safety guidelines. sharing their knowledge and expertise. We are ready I know 2021 will be a better year. We have a great to go when we get the green light to go! new team of leadership starting in January, and I In July our new D11 Commander arrived. RADM know they will lead us into Penoyer has an extensive history of working with the greater journeys than we can Auxiliary and is encouraging us to think outside the imagine. I look forward to when box when identifying areas where the AUX can we can all meet together again… support the active duty and their missions. On a recent call, the ADM told us “Everything is on the Semper Gumby! table, except DOD and law enforcement.” He is very - 3 - Vol. 27, Issue 3 From the Operations Training Officer As long as you are working to keep yourself and your families safe, and practicing your skills to the extent possible, you are making a difference! I sincerely hope that all of our members and their evaluate their fitness for families are staying safe and maintaining their sanity duty in the boat crew through this unprecedented COVID-19 pandemic. program. If you have a BOSN2 Dustin Finkelson, OTO situation which limits your As we work to bring back our Auxiliary workforce, ability to fully function as a crew member (lifting, District Eleven Auxiliary as a whole is on a limited moving safely around the boat, limited vision, “stay at home” order. Any activities involving hearing and responding to commands, etc), please leaving your home that are not authorized per the consider whether you may be better suited to serving D11 Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) - D11 as a shore-based boat crew mentor to share your Auxiliary Awareness and Guidance approved by the expertise, or perhaps volunteer in other essential District 11 Commander on July 10, 2020 require a programs. If you choose to withdraw from the boat waiver from the District Commander via SECTOR crew program, please notify your FSO-OP via email. OIAs and the DIRAUX Office. REYR – The District understands that we will There are opportunities to partake in online training inevitably have members that fall into REYR due to and to do the Surface Operations Workshop. Get the COVID-19 standown. This will be a nationwide caught up on your core training and any courses that issue. Please trust that we will be working with you have been meaning to do when you had time. National on a plan to fix all crew members REYR Take advantage of our Virtual RM/TCT training. due to Covid19. Grab a piece of line and practice tying knots. Go through all of your PPE and do a self-inspection, Facility Owners – If you have the luxury of having using the MRC cards so that you know it will pass your vessels in your backyard (or other access not when it is time to get back into it. involving violating any social distancing guidelines), take this opportunity to review your paperwork. Is Entering the second year of my tenure as OTO, I your inspection current? Go over your checklist and want to continue to focus on our training and getting check all of your gear to make sure all is available members qualified. We have all signed and serviceable. Check the material condition of up/volunteered to be servants to the public and the your vessel. Does anything need repairs? Does it run public deserves a quality product. This starts with properly and reliably? If the answer to any of these quality training. Once we can get back on the water, questions is no, take note and arrange to have the we should be actively training.