Some teenagers might be pleased to spend a Saturday on the sofa, playing video games.

Not DeLand High School students Victorianna Petersen and her brother, Vincent Petersen, and Samuel Kalvin and Carl Pierce. Along with middle-school students Jose Lebron and Jon "Jeb" Bemis, son of Ship Skipper Jon Bemis, they spend Saturdays as members of Sea Scouts Ship 544 of West Volusia.

Their uniforms may not yet be proper Navy issue. That doesn't stop them. These young people are learning seafaring skills, and having a good time doing it.

Sea Scouts is a coed program for young adults 14-20 years old, operated under the auspices of Boy Scouts of America. The group is called a "ship" rather than a "troop."

This ship meets at 7 p.m. Tuesdays at the Fire Hall in Orange City. They spend some Saturdays at the DeLand Naval Air Station Museum, where they've been restoring Patrol Torpedo Fast (PTF) 3, one of the boats sent to the Tonkin Gulf in Vietnam.

The 80-foot-long, mahogany-hulled PT boat was built in Norway and brought into service in Vietnam for covert operations. It earned the crew nickname "Fast and Nasty."

PTF 3 was one of the boats Vietnamese forces allegedly chased in the Gulf of Tonkin in August 1964, escalating the war.

President John F. Kennedy, who served on PT 109 during World War II, had ordered the boat through a joint program with Norway. After serving nine years in Vietnam, PTF 3 spent six years running special-operations missions out of Key West.

Through the efforts of area veterans and Boy Scout leaders, it was donated to the Naval Air Station Museum in DeLand, where PTF 3 has become a Sea Scout special project.

During World War II, the Japanese called PT boats "devil ships," Skipper Bemis explained, because the PTs sat low in the water and were difficult to locate. The Navy is testing a new version of the PT boat now.

Bemis served in the Gulf of Tonkin 1965-67, but not on a PT boat. He was aboard the USS Platte, a fueling ship.

"I volunteered for the Navy. It was the right thing to do," Bemis said.

He was only 17 when he left his home in western New York state to join the Navy. Bemis finished high school in the service.

He started as a bosun, then moved to the bridge as a quartermaster.

Bosuns are responsible for maintenance work on ships, and for their rigging and equipment. Quartermasters are enlisted personnel responsible for navigation, charts and navigational equipment and clocks aboard ship.

Bemis not only spent time on the USS Platte; he also went upriver 1967-68, transporting ammunition and supplies on armored amphibious vehicles called amtracks.

He worked closely with a Marine detachment in the second assignment, and after his four-year tour in the Navy was up, Bemis joined the Marines to serve another four years.

"I came out a lance corporal," he said.

Bemis then spent another two years in the Reserves.

He worked as a welder, a dump-truck driver, and a crane operator after coming out of the service. He settled in DeLand.

The chance to work on PTF 3 drew Bemis to the DeLand Naval Air Station. That, in turn, led to him being tapped as skipper of Sea Scout Ship 544, working with the group of young people.

Scoutmaster Bob McCray originally brought the young people to the project. It was through his efforts the patrol torpedo boat was donated to the troop. McCray is a Vietnam-era Army veteran, who served with the 101st Airborne Division in the U.S. and Europe.

Both Bemis and McCray relish the learning opportunity presented by the restoration project.

"They'll know it from the keel up," Bemis said. The Sea Scouts will also learn how to operate the boat safely.

On two smaller sailboats and a ketch, the Sea Scouts will soon make weekend sailing trips to further their knowledge of rigging, roping, navigation, and other seafaring skills. Bemis hopes to find a marina where these boats can be regularly docked.

The Scouts will learn pride in their uniform, pride in their boat and pride in themselves, through these activities, Bemis said.

"I treat them like adults," he added.

The oceanographic, navigational, and other naval skills these Sea Scouts learn can help them with careers in the Navy, the Coast Guard, the Merchant Marine or in industry.

It's not book-learning.

Victorianna, wearing a breathing mask, used a power sander to strip old paint off a gas tank March 16. The youths are also learning welding and machine-shop operations by working on the boat.

Right now, they're mostly working on the ship's mahogany keel. Later, they'll install mechanical and plumbing systems, and reworked engines will be put in place.

It takes two 18-piston diesel engines to power the ship, with a third for backup.

A 40 mm anti-aircraft gun, the same type used on the PTF 3 boat in Vietnam, is the project's most recent acquisition. The gun was made in 1938 in Sweden, and was also used in World War II.

When work is finished, the Scouts plan to dock the boat at Sanford. It will be run for Scout training events and maintained as a museum.

McCray said the boat restoration is meant to honor all veterans, especially those of World War II, Korea and Vietnam.

PT boat only one activity

Working on the patrol boat is not Sea Scouts Ship 544's only activity.

The Scouts plan to take part in a regatta, a boat-racing event, on March 22. What they learn through sailing — sails, rigging, knots, anchoring — will stand them in good stead.

Samuel Kalvin, a 10th-grader, plans to enlist in the Navy, and has already been accepted for the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis. Jose Lebron's father served as a Marine, and the seventh-grader is considering a military career. So are brother and sister Vincent and Victorianna Petersen, whose mother served in Afghanistan and Iraq in the U.S. Army.

This summer, some of the Scouts will cruise aboard the Coast Guard training ship USS Eagle. They will get the same training as U.S. Coast Guard cadets in ship-handling and operations.

Learning alongside Coast Guard cadets is just one of the opportunities available to Sea Scouts, Bemis said. They also learn scuba diving, and can participate in aquatic activities in the Florida Keys and other sea-exploration adventures through the program.

Bemis also plans to teach the Scouts backhoe and heavy-equipment operations — a useful tool for the Seabees, the Navy's construction battalion. Seabees build Navy bases, roads and other structures.

For more information on the local Sea Scout program, call 1-800-694-7161. Visit the Sea Scouts Web site.

To get a look at the PTF 3 restoration work, visit the DeLand Naval Air Station Museum at 910 Biscayne Blvd. on the DeLand Municipal Airport.

- pat@beacononlinenews.com

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