Las Vegas Native Serves with the U.S. Navy Half a World Away
By Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Theodore Quintana, Navy Office of Community Outreach
SASEBO, Japan – A Las Vegas native and 2014 Silverado High School graduate is serving in Japan in the U.S. Navy aboard USS Germantown.
Petty Officer 3rd Class Chandler Cipriano is an operations specialist aboard the ship operating out of Sasebo, Japan.
A Navy operations specialist is responsible for functioning as plotters, radio-telephone and Command and Control sound-powered telephone talkers and maintaining Combat Information Center (CIC) displays of strategic and tactical information.
Cipriano is proud to serve in the Pacific and fondly recalls memories of Las Vegas.
“It’s worth putting in the hard work in the Navy,” said Cipriano. “It reaps rewards. It also teaches you how to take the negative and learn from it.”
Moments like that makes it worth serving around the world ready at all times to defend America’s interests. With more than 50 percent of the world’s shipping tonnage and a third of the world’s crude oil passing through the region, the United States has historic and enduring interests in this part of the world. The Navy’s presence in Sasebo is part of that long-standing commitment, explained Navy officials.
Commissioned in 1986, Germantown is the second Navy ship named after the Revolutionary War Battle of Germantown. With a crew of more than 900 sailors and Marines, Germantown is 609 feet long and weighs approximately 16,000 tons. Designed specifically to operate landing craft air cushion small craft vessels, Whidbey Island-class dock landing ships have the largest capacity for these landing craft out of any U.S. Navy amphibious ship.
“The Navy has definitely made me more mentally tougher,” said Cipriano. “It has taught me how to be a better leader.”
As a member of one of the U.S. Navy’s most relied-upon assets, Cipriano and other sailors know they are part of a legacy that will last beyond their lifetimes providing the Navy the nation needs.
“I am glad to serve in the military because I know I am a part of something bigger than myself,” said Cipriano. “I’d like to tell my family, miss you and love you and I’ll see you in October.”
Seventh Fleet, which is celebrating its 75th year in 2018, spans more than 124 million square kilometers, stretching from the International Date Line to the India/Pakistan border; and from the Kuril Islands in the North to the Antarctic in the South. Seventh Fleet’s area of operation encompasses 36 maritime countries and 50 percent of the world’s population with between 50-70 U.S. ships and submarines, 140 aircraft, and approximately 20,000 sailors in the 7th Fleet.
