The longest continuous seagoing service, The United States Coast Guard maintains its own maintenance and damage control specialists, the Damage Control man rating. They are the personnel that are responsible for responding when the alarm goes off, and can be confronted with a variety of stricken mechanical, physical, electrical or other systems that are damaged and need repair. It is considered a deck rating, and it is a very challenging and rewarding job specialty. The primary mission of the Coast Guard is search and rescue. The Coast Guard provides emergency response to boaters, and fishermen, and serving as an enlisted Coast Guardsman is a job not for the faint of heart.
The job of Damage Control Man is a complicated one. DC?s are responsible for maintaining the watertight shipboard integrity, repairing and maintaining emergency equipment, using and maintaining firefighting equipment, and other flooding and fire equipment. The job of Damage Control Man is very challenging and a big part of the overall Coast Guard personnel response.
The Coast Guard is responsible for Aids to Navigation, as well as various law enforcement duties in support of the Department of Homeland Security. In the days since 9-11 the US Coast Guard was transferred from the Federal Department of Transportation to Homeland Security, in order to be able to help defend and protect the Coastal and Inland Waterways of the United States. The Coast Guard Damage Control man is an expert of mechanical things, and the jack of all trades in all things involving different mechanical issues. A DC is an expert on repair, period. They use tools, welders, and other devices to fabricate items for use on board ship, and they are old hands at problem solving and dealing with issues that require new and out of the box type thinking. A Coast Guard Damage control man will and perform repairs including at times biological, chemical, nuclear warfare detection and at times even decontamination. Members of the Coast Guard DC rating in the Coast Guard also work to support and inspect vessels for safety and merchant licensing issues.
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Training- As a DC specialist in the Coast Guard the DC rating has a Class A school located at Yorktown, Virginia. You will study firefighting, welding, carpentry, oxy fuel gas metal cutting, watertight integrity training, and biological, chemical and nuclear warfare defense.
