Dear CDRSalamander,

As someone who devoted three days of her life to the rescue and assistance efforts—and someone who previously served on board the USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD-6) as both an assistant damage control assistant and damage control assistant—I find it perplexing that you had to ask yourself, “Where was the Navy?” Because, CDRSalamander, I saw the Navy show up in literal full-force.

I saw the Constitutional Paradigm at work. From Day One, I saw sailors rushing to evacuate people from their cars for fear the ship would blow up and kill them. I saw people volunteer their whole Sunday to assist however they could, give their own money so responders had water and Gatorade. I saw main propulsion assistants conduct line handling with precision and poise; men and women hump shore power cables with all deliberate speed; sailors from other ships volunteer to get under way with a ship in need. I saw commands give more than the lion’s share of their damage control Equipment. I saw sailors go into an inferno—to face one of the worst fires the U.S. Navy has witnessed in the modern era—and fight to save their ship; to save their shipmates’ ship. I watched them do it again and again and again; hour after grueling hour; day after sun-soaked day. I watched teams of personnel treat blisters, dehydration, severe sunburns. I watched people violently vomit from heat exhaustion, then return to the line to continue their service. I watched sailors drop shore power cables on their feet, shake it off, and get back to work getting a ship under way.

For the first time since I joined the Navy, we were not divided by commands or warfare communities: We were one Navy. We were committed to the Bonhomme Richard and her crew. We were in perfect lock-step—a unified team with a singular purpose. It was not the first time I had ever cried, “WE ARE BHR”—but it was the first time the “we” was the whole of the waterfront.

So it is difficult for me to accept that you could not find the public face of the Navy. They were right there all along: the fatigued faces covered in sweat and soot. If your disdain is with leadership—if it is a press conference you wanted—then I invite you to say as much. But at no point should you confuse them with the public face of the Navy. We are that face. And as for my Navy—we did right by the Bonhomme Richard; we did right by each other; we did right by the American people. And if San Diego ever called on us to do the same for her, I have no doubt that the sailors with whom I spent 72 hours on-scene at the Bonhomme Richard would be the first to roger up.