Five Ohio Petty Officers Aboard the USS Gravely Return to Norfolk After Eight Months at Sea

 

NORFOLK, Virginia — The USS Gravely, DDG 107, returned on Tuesday after eight months at sea. On board were five Petty Officers from Ohio: STG1 Ryan Butsch, DC1 David Favors, CTT1 Tyler Hagberg, GSE2 Austin Lear and CTT2 Amy Wallace.

Butsch is a Sonar Technician (STG) and Petty Officer First Class. He and his wife Kelly have two children, Michael and Nyla. All were on hand to welcome him home. The Butschs are high school sweethearts from Hillsboro, a small town in southwestern Ohio. “Both our families still live there, making holidays really easy,” Kelly shared. Kelly is one of the two ombudsman for the Gravely, helping Navy families find answers to questions from childcare to health insurance to navigating family emergencies.

Warren-native Petty Officer First Class David Favors is a Damage Controlman. “They are the enlisted men and women of the U.S. Navy who do the work necessary for ship stability, firefighting, fire prevention, damage control, and chemical, biological, and radiological (CBR) warfare defense,” according to Operation Military Kids. Favors has served for fifteen years. Waiting for him was his wife Tanesia and two boys, Taylor and David Junior (DJ). DJ was born on June 9 while his father was away at sea — the day after his mother’s birthday. Tuesday was Favors’ first opportunity to hold his newborn son.

Kelsey Hagberg is the President of the USS Gravely’s Family Readiness Group. Her husband Tyler is a Petty Officer First Class who has served in the Navy ten years and works as a Cryptologic Technician. The job is highly classified and involves analysis of radar, operating detection and deception systems and more. Although Tyler was an Air Force kid who moved around a lot, he found a home, and Kelsey, in northeastern Ohio. He adopted Chardon as his hometown.

Petty Officer Second Class Lear, a five and a half year sailor, had a wife, son, mother, father and grandmother waiting for his return. The Gas Turbine Systems Technician-Electrical was one of the first three sailors to disembark. At the family party the night before, his mother had won “Adult First Hug,” earning Lear the early exit from the ship. His mother gave the “hug” to her daughter-in-law Addison, who was escorted to meet her husband for their first embrace in eight months. Their young son Caden was soon added to the mix and the family was complete once again.

Amy Wallace works on the Gravely with Hagberg as a Cryptologic Technician and she’s also served in the Navy for five and a half years. Her hometown is Concord. The Petty Officer Second Class was greeted by her parents, Tom and Cheryl Wallace, who made the trip from Ohio to see their daughter.

Wallace joined with three of her fellow Ohioans, Lear, Favors and Hagberg, for a quintessentially Ohio photo before they docked — a very appropriate pose the week the Buckeye football season begins.

The Arleigh Burke-Class guided-missile destroyer spent the majority of their deployment in Europe acting as the flagship of the NATO fleet in the northern Atlantic and Baltic Sea area.

 

While in the far north of the hemisphere, the crew earned the “Order of the Blue Nose, Realm of the Arctic Circle” patch which celebrates crossing the Arctic Circle.

 

On their way home, the USS Gravely joined two ships from the Royal Danish Navy for exercises off the coast of Greenland, resulting in a later-than-expected return date.

 

After many kisses, hugs and tears of joy, the men and women of the USS Gravely left Naval Station Norfolk to enjoy a well-earned break from the ship.

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Beth Lear is a reporter at The Ohio Star.  Follow Beth on Twitter.  Email tips to [email protected].

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