When Lone Tree native Doug Langenberg (’97) graduated high school, he attended college visits but didn’t feel quite ready to continue his education. Instead, he enlisted in the U.S. Navy. Capt. Langenberg never intended for the military to be a career, but 30 years in and now commanding the USS John F. Kennedy — the Navy’s newest aircraft carrier — he reflects on the evolution of his service.
Tell us about your career so far.
The Navy was just a job at first, but once the Gulf War happened, it took on a different purpose for me and became more about service. It has been step by step from there. At first I was a junior officer flying in tactics, which kept me interested, then later in my flying career it became about building teams and executing the mission. It has been a really hardworking, fun, and rewarding career.
What does it mean to you to be commanding an aircraft carrier?
It’s pretty neat and a little surreal. When you walk up to this thing, it’s 1,100 feet long, weighs 100,000 tons, and it’s a big chunk of steel. It makes you chuckle a bit when you look at that and think that it’s going to go to sea and successfully launch and recover airplanes. For what it means to me, I like to see success on a sailor’s face. When we get an opportunity to finally go to sea with this new carrier, and sailors register that they’re the ones taking the ship to sea and coming back successfully and safely, that’s what makes me smile and keeps me going in this career.
What skills and values did you gain from growing up in Iowa and attending Iowa State?
I was a civil engineering major and I don’t think I ever really used the degree formally, but at the same time, I definitely took skills away from it. First in the aviation part of my career to be able to do quick math in the airplane; those little skills that they teach us go a long way. Second, in the later part of my career to be a carrier CO, you go through about a nine-year process. It starts out with a lot of school — one of the most grueling schools I’ve ever been to in my life — for nuclear power training. I’ve been through it twice now and having that technical background skill really helped me out.
On the other side, the values piece, I would say that Iowans are down-to-earth, salt-of-the-earth kind of people who are humble, kind, and genuine. I’ve learned from and hopefully practiced those values throughout my career. I’ve been all over the world and lived in 15 different places, and over the 30 years of my career, I’ve really never found the same kind of people. I try to convey to others that if you do your best work and don’t brag about it, that has the most stay power. When you see folks in Iowa, they never have to boast about anything; they just go and do it.