Sailors flocked to a unique barber shop in Brisbane, Australia, when the carrier George Washington visited earlier this week. (Courtesy of Barber Babes)
Well, it’s certainly not a service offered at the ship’s barber shop.
Eager to maintain the command’s high grooming standards during its stay in Brisbane, Australia, sailors flocked to a local barber shop where the hair dressers were a tad under-dressed.
Jasmine Robson, owner and director of Barber Babes in downtown Brisbane, opened the topless hair cuttery in 2013 as part of her adult entertainment complex Grosvenor on George.
When the aircraft carrier George Washington visited in 2013, her business was inundated with sailors looking for a haircut with a view, and she wasn’t prepared.
“When the last carrier visited, we had NO idea it was on its way!” Robson said in an email. “We just got inundated with U.S Navy wanting haircuts. We didn’t have enough staff, alcohol or food initially. We soon got it, but those first few hours were HECTIC!”
The Grosvenor, which includes a topless bar and strip club as well as the barber shop, got a little more advanced notice in June, thanks to plenty of deckplate buzz aboard the GW about the unique coiffures of Brisbane, according to a local news report.
Jasmine Robson
“Everybody was talking about it on the ship so I decided to send an email and make an appointment,” one George Washington sailor told the paper, adding: “The service is great. She seems like she’s very talented.”
Robson said she started getting calls and emails for appointments in the week ahead of the carrier’s June 19 arrival and was completely booked. She even added hours on Sunday and Monday for the sailors, days Barber Babes is usually closed.
She also had to call for backup in the bar and strip club, flying in exotic dancers from all over Australia to meet the overwhelming demand. Grosvenor’s floor staff, in various stages of undress, grew from about 30 on a normal night to 75 during the GW’s visit. Robson also added two extra hair dressers for the barber shop, she said
Robson said the sailors were all well behaved and very polite.
“The girls are there with their boobs out and they’re calling them ‘ma’am’. It’s so cute,” she said, according to the local news report.
Robson told Navy Times Barber Babes made about 185 sailors inspection ready during GW’s five-day stay in Brisbane.
The prices at Barber Babes start at $25 for the clipper cuts required for male sailors but you can spend up to $60 for the works. Women’s haircuts start at $60 but can range up to as much as $200 and more for highlights and extensions, according to the website.
The ship left June 23 for Exercise Talisman Saber, which includes about 33,000 U.S. and Australian service members. The cruiser Antietam and the destroyer Fitzgerald were also in Brisbane along side GW.
In addition to topless haircuts, the sailors also got into some more family-friendly fun, according to local press. The sailors visited hospitals, performed community projects and visited a local koala sanctuary. The George Washington sailors also played — and lost — to local police in a soccer match.
The loss continued a troubling pattern of U.S. Navy soccer futility. Earlier in the year the Theodore Roosevelt’s sailors lost a devastating match with the crew of a Royal Navy frigate by the ignominious score of 15-2.
