To adhere with international law and do its part for the environment, the Navy uses the Shipboard Solid Waste Management program to ensure only materials not harmful to the environment make it overboard, while the rest makes it ashore for recycling.

While proper waste collection and disposal is the responsibility of the entire crew of the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69) (Ike), the task of breaking trash down falls on the teams of Sailors who work in Ike's waste processing centers. These crew members, assigned temporary additional duty (TAD) to Engineering department, accept trash day and night.

"You have to deal with trash, but it's pretty laid back," said Airman Dylan Queen, TAD to waste management from Air department's V-2 division. "There is no one looking over your shoulder, so you have to be able to work independently. The trash never stops coming, so you have to come on your shift ready to do your job."

The equipment the Navy uses to process its trash requires that the waste materials be separated into four groups: paper, food and cardboard (pulpable); wood and rags (burnable); plastics and metals.

Paper and food items are first processed through a shredder. After that, the shredded waste is mixed with water until it forms a pulp, which is then pumped into the sea. Plastics are compacted by a compressed melt unit (CMU) into solid disks, or 'pucks.' Metals are shredded and placed in burlap sacks before being thrown overboard, and burnables are sent to the incinerator in the ship's aft trash room.

When Sailors bring their trash, it must be sorted, and the bag must be marked by the disposing division with specific information: the type of trash in the bag, the division it's from and the division's J-Dial phone number.

Machinist's Mate 3rd Class Andre Cooper said that putting the wrong waste through the wrong process can damage equipment.

"Unsorted trash is the main problem we get," Cooper said. "It's important to sort trash because it keeps the machines running well. It also prevents us from accidentally contaminating the ocean with something that shouldn't have been there."

This is even more important now, he said, as even waste management is an inspection item for the ship's upcoming Board of Inspection and Survey (INSURV).

"Just like with everything else we're doing to prepare for INSURV, we have to show step-by-step that we know exactly what we're doing with the equipment," Cooper said.

For more news from USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69), visit www.navy.mil/.