Just last week ship number 4 took off for the open sea. The
USNS Supply was in the drydock outside of our office for about 3 weeks. Apparently this supply ship has returned to active service as of this year, and it was undoubtedly parked in Boston for maintenance and repairs. The photograph shown is actually a collage of photographs taken from
Radlab. These were taken just as the ship was edging in, heading for the rear of the dry dock. It never ceases to amaze me how such a giant, rigid, weighty object can be so buoyant.
Here's an article on the ship from
wikipedia...
USNS Supply is the lead ship of the Supply class fast combat support ships. She was laid down on 24 February 1989 and was launched on 6 October 1990. After service in the United States Navy from 1994 through 2001 as USS Supply (AOE-6), her weapons systems were removed and she was transferred on August 29, 2003 to the Military Sealift Command, which designated her USNS Supply (T-AOE-6).
Supply has the speed to keep up with the carrier strike groups. She rapidly replenishes Navy task forces. She receives petroleum products, ammunition and stores from shuttle ships and redistributes these items simultaneously to carrier strike group ships. This reduces the vulnerability of serviced ships by reducing alongside time. Like other fast combat support ships, she is part of MSC's Naval Fleet Auxiliary Force.
Latin: scraped tablet or clean slate
1__TABULA RASA refers to the epistemological thesis that individual human beings are born with no innate or built-in mental content, in a word, "blank", and that their entire resource of knowledge is built up gradually from their experiences and sensory perceptions of the outside world. - wikipedia, Jan. 2, 2007
Romans 7:21-25
2__The Apostle Paul writes in Romans chapter 7: [21]So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. [22]For in my inner being I delight in God's law; [23]but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. [24]What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? [25]Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!
A New Tabula Rasa, John 3:1-5
3__Jesus talks to Nicodemus about being born again: [1]Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish ruling council. [2]He came to Jesus at night and said, "Rabbi, we know you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the miraculous signs you are doing if God were not with him." [3]In reply Jesus declared, "I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again." [4]"How can a man be born when he is old?" Nicodemus asked. "Surely he cannot enter a second time into his mother's womb to be born!" [5]Jesus answered, "I tell you the truth, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless he is born of water and the Spirit.
