An unexpected detour

What a crazy morning.  Yesterday the Captain came on the intercom at 8:30 am and announced that we would be stopping at  Diego Garcia, an island in the Indian Ocean owned by Britain but leased to the US as a highly classified radar/satellite base, we think.  We were going to drop off three passengers who needed urgent medical care, who were then to be evacuated by the military to Singapore from Diego Garcia!   Many passengers had mused the night before that we were doing between 25-28 knots and must have been in a hurry.  Well, as it turned out, we were.

As our ship approached the islands, two tugboats escorted by two Zodiacs carrying Navy Seals armed to the gills, raced toward the ship to let off a pilot to take us into the lagoon, and to board Seals who were supposed to "sweep" the ship!  Now if you don't think that sounds ominous! Six Seals, a German shepherd bomb-detecting dog and the pilot boarded the ship.  Then we saw a submarine off our bow, probably 1/4 mile away!  In the meantime, the ship's crew assembled the dock on which the group boarded.  Dean Dan later told us that the military weren't sure if we had been captured by pirates - hence the sweep to secure the ship.  Actually they had been following us for days by radar wanting to see what ship was travelling so fast.

                                                                                           

Meanwhile, the two Zodiacs with Seals with rifles continued to race back and forth, another boat with only a machine gunner  patroled, and a "hospital" ship joined the parade.  After they swept the ship, (2 were on the flying bridge with the captain) the hospital ship backed up to the dock and 3 passengers were offloaded, one on a stretcher.  We understand the young girl has a blood disorder, and Mimosa, a student who was severly burned as a child, had infections which our medical staff couldn't adequately treat. The third was a male crew person. 

 All of the Navy Seals who had been on board and the pilot disembarked.  Everyone on board the ship cheered and clapped and the Seals either saluted or waved.  It was quite an emotional scene.  All of this took about 2 hours.

When the patients were being loaded, Randi, one of the nurses handed the Seals something white, which we assumed belonged to one of the patients.  About 5 minutes later, one of them in a Zodiac, stood up and waved a "Semester at Sea" T-shirt.  Everyone on board cheered.   Here we are in the middle of the Indian Ocean waving to American boys stationed at a secluded base, and seeing American flags waving, and they came to our rescue.  When the Seals first arrived, they were serious and solemn but when they saw all of the young students on board, I think they probably felt as much emotion as we did. Too bad all of the girls weren't in their bikinis!  Good for the American soul to be reminded that our military is there to serve when needed and not always on a battlefield.

I speculated as to what it must have taken to get help from this base.  The Captain, our Executive Dean, SAS and ISE in Virginia, the military in Washington or wherever, all had to have been involved.  Captain Jeremy is English which probably helped as well, since there is a British presence on the island (Union Jacks flying on boats as well).  And I thought the 6-day trip to India would be boring!

P.S.  BTW, the Captain told us not to take pictures of the base, but I assumed that didn't mean we couldn't take photos of the rescue.  Plus I told Dean Dan that I was going to publish on the blog and he said it was all right.


P.P.S.  We are now 10 1/2 hours ahead of the East Coast!  How does that happen?  We had to move our clocks ahead 1/2 hour last night.