Welder finds a purpose in life: His job at shipyard threatened by base realignment proposal

This is the first in the Seacoast Online's series on shipyard workers and their loved ones, and how their lives have changed since the Defense Department recommended the closure of the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard.

KITTERY, Maine - Tom Doster finally found a job he enjoyed, but now, it may be taken away.

Doster doesn’t have a family to provide for; he’s not paying a mortgage; but he does have goals and life ambitions.

Since October 2004, when he became a welder apprentice, those aspirations began to revolve around the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard.

That is until Friday, May 13, when a co-worker told him the shipyard had been placed on a Defense Department closure list.

"It was a slap in the face," Doster said. "I tried and tried to do something with my life."

Doster, 21, said he could see himself working at the shipyard for many years, but now he’s re-evaluating his life - again.

After high school, Doster attended two colleges, but dropped out of both.

"I knew I had to get a job," he said. "I had to do something with my life."

While searching on the Internet for a job, Doster found an ad for the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, which was looking for men and women to begin their apprenticeship program, which typically lasts four years and trains them to become shipyard workers.

He said it was a perfect fit.

"It’s not like college, because your learning a trade," Doster said. "I’m in a career I have a future in."

He works with many men and women who have college degrees, who are from a "diverse" background, as well as young people like him who are just staring to find their place in life.

"This is the first time in my life that I wake up in the morning and don’t say, ‘Ugh, another day at work,’" Doster said. "I actually enjoy going to work."

A typical day for Doster begins early when he wakes up in his Tyngsborough, Mass., home. He usually passes through the shipyard’s gate before 7 a.m.

He meets with his supervisor before boarding a nuclear submarine and begins to weld as part of the yard’s overhaul and modernization work.

When asked why he enjoys his job so much, Doster smiles.

"I work on nuclear submarines," he said. "It’s not something everyone does."

Read the rest of this piece over at the Portsmouth Herald website.