US Navy Destroyer Severely Damaged in Collision

[LSP552]

He’s not wrong though, you do have to be able to handle fatigue. And leaders have to be able to try and manage it, but there is a fine line there and a lot of times, it’s damn near impossible. Sure, you can stop a training exercise due to the risk, but if you can’t do it in training, then you won’t do it in war. I think the military has struggled a lot over the Obama years and with the downsizing because the expectations never decreased. People were the first to go. Equipment was next, but we’re still trying to do that. The requirements expected of an organization however, those never shrank. So with less people, to work it, there was more work to be shared. He’s right about not having enough people on the ship, but VERY few leaders can do anything about that.


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At some point you can’t do more with less. You have to prioritize and accept doing less with less.

[willie]

I'm reminded of the Jimmy Carter years when budget cuts brought about equipment failure and greatly reduced training time.

[Chance]

He’s not wrong though, you do have to be able to handle fatigue. And leaders have to be able to try and manage it, but there is a fine line there and a lot of times, it’s damn near impossible. Sure, you can stop a training exercise due to the risk, but if you can’t do it in training, then you won’t do it in war.

I get that, but this isn't an exercise or war. It's day-to-day operations.

About 19 hours without sleep roughly equals a BAC of 0.05% in terms of impairment. We have people piloting 9,000 ton warships that are effectively drunk, and that's standard operating procedure.

[Aray]

I get that, but this isn't an exercise or war. It's day-to-day operations.

About 19 hours without sleep roughly equals a BAC of 0.05% in terms of impairment. We have people piloting 9,000 ton warships that are effectively drunk, and that's standard operating procedure.

For my years running the nuclear propulsion plant on a Cruiser, every third day was a scheduled 20 hour work day. I got out in 1995.

[Dog Guy]

Another interesting take on how this could play out: http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art...%80%99s-office

[Stephanie B]

Another interesting take on how this could play out: http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art...%80%99s-office

They court-martialed the Captain and the Officer of the Deck of the USS Belknap after the Belknap-JFK collision. The CO was acquitted. The OOD was found guilty of negligence and awarded no punishment. The OOD was praised by the his CO as being a fine young officer, the type of officer that the Navy needed. The OOD thanked him and said that he was going to get out of the Navy ASAP.

[Glenn E. Meyer]

Will someone get in trouble for getting frozen in place?

https://news.usni.org/2018/01/19/uss...k-ice-montreal

It's not unknown for that area to get cold.

[Lester Polfus]

Will someone get in trouble for getting frozen in place?

https://news.usni.org/2018/01/19/uss...k-ice-montreal

It's not unknown for that area to get cold.

Huh. If so, it probably shouldn't have be the skipper. She was delivered to the Navy in Wisconsin in September. It sounds like they decided to keep her inside the seaway in a December commissioning, next to the old Little Rock. Sounds like they were planning on the seaway staying open later than it did.

[GardoneVT]

Fitzgerald officer of the deck pleads guilty at court-martial

WASHINGTON — The junior lieutenant in charge of navigating the USS Fitzgerald when it collided with a commercial vessel pleaded guilty Tuesday to dereliction of duty and acknowledged her role in the deaths of seven sailors last year.

https://www.stripes.com/fitzgerald-o...rtial-1.525888

The fact the defense attorney cited testing which showed the officers scored 59% on navigation knowledge,combined with one of the duty officers not even understanding what traffic separation meant leads me to two unhappy conclusions.

One- the Navy brass* is sacrificing three officers as a dodge against fixing institutional issues with training and ops tempo.
Two- the same group of Admirals (some of whom might be in court already due to Fat Leonard) are more concerned about department reputation then fixing the problems that have killed multiple sailors on multiple incidents. Which means this will probably happen again, and another group of sailers will pay for their bosses’ mistakes with their careers and maybe even their lives.


*disclaimer: I’m not trying to throw stones at the Navy. Goodness knows the Air Force has political BS in its own history ,as does the Army & USMC. That said I find it sad an ethical officer is being burned for a mistake she couldn’t realistically avoid. If a ships crew doesn’t know the rules of the job it doesn’t matter what the officer on duty does.

[Chance]

From Stars and Stripes:

As officer of the deck on June 17, Coppock was responsible for the safe navigation of the ship after the commanding officer went to his quarters that evening. The ship had been conducting evolutions all day, and the crew was tired.

Coppock testified that she had been instructed by the commanding officer to maintain 20 knots, even as the ship traversed heavily trafficked waters and its main navigation radar stopped working fully about an hour before the collision.

This may just be how the article is worded, but this seems to indicate the commanding officer knew the navigation radar wasn't working, correct?