So I was CHENG on TICO in the late 90s. I fortunately, showed up at about month 69 of a 70 month install of the production variant of the "SMARTSHIP" program for engineering controls throughout the CG47 variant of Ticonderoga cruisers. USS Yorktown was the test ship and TICO was lucky (or unlucky) enough to get the first production line of the hardware/software install. The initial plan was the install was to be only 9 weeks and we were at month 69. Needless to say, it left some scars on a lot of people. But we could see the finishline and were glad to get out and start the training cycle again and deploy. We completed our training cycle and deployed on a UNITAS deployment down to South America. It was for the most part a fantastic deployment. But there was one day when after the excitement was over, you kind of scratched you head and needed a breather. We were off of Argentina operating with the Argentinian Navy. The ship needed fuel and we were doing an UNREP alongside an Argentinian Oiler and everything was going smoothly. Boring is good when you are doing an UNREP. You never want any excitement. We had lines over and were taking on fuel when out of the blue (both figuratively and literally) both the Navigation Consoles and the Integrated Helm Console started to act up. The Sailors did what Sailors do and followed procedures and transferred control to alternate controls stations and we proceeded to execute an Emergency Breakaway from the oiler. As we were breaking away, all the consoles on the bridge gave us what everyone's fear is for their own computer - "The Blue Screen Of Death". You all have seen it. However, seeing the blue screen of death while alongside an oiler on a 10,000 ton warship with those very computers controlling propulsion is NOT boring! The blue screens with all the various numbers cleared and at the end of the computer reboot or whatever it was doing, the screen displayed - Contact Your Vendor. That was a "sporty" day at sea.

- D H.