It was from Commander Hamilton that I finally obtained the names of the ships that were coming into port. Also present, Lcdr Geoff Hamilton, CO of HMCS Donnacona, our local naval reserve unit, currently located just a few blocks from where I work in St-Henri. This being a naval event, steeped in naval tradition, there was of course a naval delegation present, headed by Commodore David Craig, RCN. But as I've learned.this is pretty much par for the course in 3BAM and hardly worth commenting on.Ĭapt Richard Ayoub "hoists" our "colours" so to speak. Needless to also say, as soon as we got to the Old Port, I realized that the sun would be in entirely the wrong place for good photos of the ship, creating severe contrasts and creating yucky hard shadows on everything. At this point in the game, one might be tempted to think that we'd had our quota of screw-ups for the day, but as I will shortly explain, the best was still to come. That wasn't the case, but all of our stores were now covered in fine white dry chemicals. On the way to the Old Port, one of the two fire extinguishers in the truck back of the vehicle somehow "went off," making what looked like smoke and prompting those of us in the other vehicles to think the brake on the 25pdr had not been properly released or had somehow become engaged, causing it to overheat and smoke. If not.we'd have had major problems.Ĭmdre David Craig, RCN (right) and Lcdr Geoff Hamilton, RCN (left) In retrospect, it was a good thing that we had decided to have it present to serve as a support vehicle. We actually had enough personnel present to man two guns, but as luck would have it, both FAT's had mechanical problems that day and we were forced to use only one gun and tow it behind Colonel Borne's red pickup truck. We had planned to have two guns for the salute. The mission however, just didn't go according to plan. Good for 3BAM, bad for me.īut this isn't about me it's about the mission.
From the beginning, nothing went according to plan this day, including my participation in the event which was only made possible by the cancellation of a boudoir / pin-up shoot which was supposed to have taken place at 11.000 AM. I don't know why, but it is and if I weren't a skeptic, disbelieving in all things supernatural or that can't be explained by science, or at the very least by careful examination, I'd be sorely tempted to believe there was something to this or that we were cursed. The number 13 is considered unlucky in western culture. Maybe we should have looked at the date a little more closely.
I obviously didn't and served in the finest arm of service in the army instead, but I still carry great respect for seafarers and consider it an honour that 3BAM had the opportunity to engage in an age old naval tradition of firing a salute when foreign warships, in this case the Korean destroyer ROKS Dae Jo Yeong and the combat support ship ROKS Hwa Cheon entered the Port Of Montreal this October 13th. In my youth, enamored of tales of submarine warfare in WWII, I had mostly wanted to serve in the navy rather than the army. I have to confess that I've always had a great deal of respect for those in peril on the sea.
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