The News Feed
Want to know more? Get up to date with the latest stories about service members and how all six branches make a positive impact every day.
Hear from young service members about their decisions to join, the friendships they’ve forged, the skills they’ve developed, and their opportunities to make an impact in the Military.
Petty Officer 1st Class
As a young man, Timothy was always seeking an environment that promoted discipline and professionalism. He found it in the US Coast Guard. As a Damage Controlman First Class, he is regularly inspecting and maintaining Coast Guard Cutters to ensure the safety and mission readiness of the crew.
"We're firefighters, welders, plumbers, carpenters. We're basically the jack-of-all-trades."
Petty Officer 1st Class Timothy Florez Adams demonstrates some of his duties as a damage controlman for the Coast Guard. Adams, who is stationed in Boston, is trained to repair anything on a Coast Guard cutter, and he also knows how to respond to emergency situations.
Length 1:19 View TranscriptPetty Officer 1st Class Timothy J. Florez Adams: My name is Timothy J. Florez Adams. I am a damage controlman 1st class. We're firefighters, welders, plumbers, carpenters. We're basically the jack-of-all-trades. I support everyone on the boat from the CO all the way down to the smallest non-rate. I have to work with everybody. I do a fire marshal, so I go throughout the ship, check out safety discrepancies, making sure that our firefight equipment is being PMSed, things are being stored properly. Then I still have to go back to my fabricating and welding, maintain things from, like a new bookshelf, to, we just lost this mounting bracket for this. We gotta fabricate one, weld it in. But we're still doing a lot of plumbing, and we do a lot of training for the firefighting, and then if we have to, we'll go back to the CBNR, then we do a lot of training on that. I care a lot. I care about making sure that when my ship's underway, that the safety and the crew are gonna happen, that we're well-trained, well-qualified, the spaces are maintained the way they're supposed to be, and it's a constant battle for me because little things add up, and the responsibility does get overwhelming sometimes. But, lucky for me, I've got a great shop that works with me, and they help me out a lot, and it makes my job a lot easier because they understand what I go through because they're gonna be in my shoes shortly, and they help me enforce what we need to do, and correct things that keep things going.
A Coast Guard Damage Controlman at Work