Sea Scout Ship 0399, or the “SSS Freedom” gathers for a white-water rafting trip. Ship 0399 is the local Sea Scout unit in the Gorge. A program for youth ages 14-20, it teaches members foundational water and maritime skills.
Pictured left to right is Ryah O'dell, Deidre Baumgarten, Annika Baumgarten and Logan Baumgarten as the Ship travelled through the locks at The Dalles Dam.
Sea Scout Ship 0399, or the “SSS Freedom” gathers for a white-water rafting trip. Ship 0399 is the local Sea Scout unit in the Gorge. A program for youth ages 14-20, it teaches members foundational water and maritime skills.
THE DALLES — Living in the Columbia River Gorge, whether you are hopping on a kiteboard, traveling the waterfall corridor or commuting across bridges, water is a major part of local life. Local Sea Scout Ship 0399 aims to teach Gorge-area youth foundational water and maritime skills to not only practice safety on one of the most intrinsic elements of the community, but build leadership skills and the desire to make a difference in the community.
A branch of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA), the Sea Scouts BSA is a co-ed scouting organization educating youth ages 14-20 on topics such as boating, navigation and other maritime skills.
Youth and adult volunteers from Ship 0399 go over Husum Falls as part of a white-water rafting trip on the White Salmon River.
Contributed photo
“We (the community) live on a river, I think that anytime you’ve got people living near water, water safety is absolutely, 100% imperative,” Deidre Baumgarten, skipper of Ship 0399, said. “Just being very respectful of water. We learn a lot about the environment and nature, and as Scouts, we’re constantly trying to leave it better than we found it.”
According to Baumgarten, in the summertime the Sea Scouts participate in a variety of water activities where they learn foundational water and boating skills, such as basic operation of various vessels, safety, terminology, knot work and chart reading. During the winter, members focus more on learning about scouting and advancing ranks within the organization.
“We help build character, build self-esteem, build confidence … while having fun on the water and making new friends,” Baumgarten said. “It’s about building … people and citizens … as they grow into young adults and go out into the world, and they have these foundational skills to build on.”
The Sea Scouts ranking system includes Apprentice, Ordinary, Able, and Quartermaster. Members start off working their way towards apprentice level, with each rank advancement requiring the demonstration of varying levels of knowledge about Sea Scouting, its history and maritime traditions, water- and boating-related safety protocols and vessel operations, and eventually conducting service projects in the community.
Pictured left to right, Logan Baumgarten, Tanner Wilson, Parker Pierce help with weed removal for The Dalles Irrigation District.
Contributed photo
One member trying to achieve her Quartermaster rank, Baumgarten’s daughter Annika, chose to install 76 new boat cleats — t-shaped bars boaters can use to tie down their vessels — in The Dalles guest marina as her required service project. According to Baumgarten, Annika worked to raise all funds through public and private donations, including a financial donation from the Port of The Dalles, as well as a donation of materials from Fastenal Fulfillment Center. She then organized a “work party” to get all the cleats installed.
“That’s where the kids, as they come up through the program, they learn the organizational skills and the leadership skills that they need to be able to lead other people in a project of this capacity,” Baumgarten said.
Outside of what members do to advance ranks, the Sea Scouts also perform group community projects over the summer, such as cleaning up garbage and old fishing lines around the port and marina, or clearing weeds from the river-water intake filters for The Dalles Irrigation District. Every summer, Ship 0399 also acts as a safety vessel for the annual Fourth of July fireworks show, maintaining a pre-established safety perimeter to keep other water vessels outside of the fireworks' fallout zone.
“So, every year we’ll be out on the river making sure the community and people stay safe for the fireworks,” Baumgarten said.
She also noted that while the adult volunteers are there to establish safety and to make sure things are running smoothly, the organization is youth-led, and all ages are participating. “The youth are the ones who are driving the boats, who are doing all of the maintenance on the boats, doing all of the navigation and reading the charts and knowing where we’re going and how fast we’re going and when we’re going to get there … it’s all hands-on for them,” Baumgarten said.
Besides community service projects, the Sea Scouts also participate in a variety of activities such as white-water rafting trips or competing in Regattas — competitions in which members compete against other ships in maritime skills such as knot tying, rowing, compass reading, identifying different parts of a boat, throwing a heaving line, practicing man overboard drills and more.
This summer, the ship also held a “Summer Cruise,” where they spent eight days on the river from Arlington to The Dalles, before meeting up with two more Portland-based ships and traveling up the John Day River and back to The Dalles, where they then traveled to Camas and Vancouver, Washington, before then traveling back up to Arlington.
Pictured left to right is Ryah O'dell, Deidre Baumgarten, Annika Baumgarten and Logan Baumgarten as the Ship travelled through the locks at The Dalles Dam.
Contributed photo
“It was a lot of fun … we’ll be trying to do that as an annual event with the other crews next year,” Baumgarten said. “The Boy Scouts and the Cub Scouts … they go to summer camp, we do summer cruise.”
Baumgarten also noted that if members had a particular interest in learning certain skills or participating in certain projects or activities, they would work to cater to their interests.
“Two years ago, we had a group of Scouts that wanted to get scuba certified, so now they're scuba certified,” Baumgarten said. “It opens up a lot of doors … one of our Scouts went off to the Navy, and he may have the opportunity to do some diving down off the California coast, or wherever he goes or gets stationed … you never know where it’s going to lead.”
Right now, Ship 0399 is looking for new members. Baumgarten emphasized that people can join any time of the year, and the organization is flexible enough to work around any school and/or extracurricular schedules. She encourages anyone interested to attend one of their meetings, held on Tuesdays from 7–9 p.m. at United Church of Christ (UCC) Congregational Church (111 East Fifth St.) in The Dalles, to see if Sea Scouting is something that would fit with their interests.
Anyone wanting to sign up can go to seascouts.org and type in The Dalles or Hood River area codes to apply for membership with Ship 0399. Baumgarten noted that there is an annual fee to register with the BSA, but there are scholarships available. She also said the group does as much fundraising as possible to let members earn their uniforms. “Money is never, never, never, never an issue why somebody can’t join scouts,” Baumgarten said.
According to Baumgarten, the scouts fundraise primarily through bottle and can donations, as well as through private donations. “We do a lot of community service in recycling and can clean up … we’ve raised thousands of dollars, 10 cents at a time,” she said.
Anyone interested in donating bottles and cans can reach out to Baumgarten at 707-363-5353 or sssfreedom399@gmail.com to prearrange a pickup, or can drop them off at a Sea Scouts meeting.
For more information about Ship 0399, visit their Facebook page: www.facebook.com/SSSFreedom399. Anyone with questions can reach out to Baumgarten directly or go to beascout.org. to learn more about Sea Scouts BSA.
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