University of Maine field hockey assistant coach Rebecca Ouellet said she was pleased that the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery was spared from closure Wednesday when the Base Realignment and Closure Commission ruled against the Department of Defense’s recommendation to do so.

That’s because Ouellet has spent her last three summers working at the shipyard for SUBMEPP (Submarine Maintenance, Engineering, Planning and Procurement).

And she may return next summer after she finishes up her master’s degree in business administration this May. She graduated from Maine with an engineering degree in 2004.

“If it had closed, they recommended that SUBMEPP move to the naval base in Norfolk, Va.,” said Ouellet, who spends her summers living with her family in Amesbury, Mass., while commuting 35 minutes to Kittery for work.

“I wasn’t afraid to move. For me, it wasn’t that big of a deal. But a lot of people I work with are rooted in the community. They all have families. And a lot of the guys are close to retirement,” said Ouellet, who played four years of field hockey and two years of ice hockey at Maine.

Ouellet enjoys her summer job on docked submarines and it could turn into a year-round job some day.

“We do a lot of office work. Every component on a submarine has to have its maintenance documented. It’s a very interesting engineering job,” said Ouellet, whose specialty is the hydraulic systems.

But she also loves coaching and the business field.

“If I work on submarines after I finish school, I could be perfectly happy doing that. But I’m one of those people who enjoy doing different things. I like to keep busy. I love athletics and the business aspect of what I do,” said Ouellet, who is in her second season as an assistant coach. “But I suffered through four years of engineering so I might as well use it.”