According to ProPublica, the cases against the officers of the Fitzgerald and McCain were dropped because of command interference - the judge ruled the Chief of Naval Operations' comments were not accidental, but purposeful. https://www.propublica.org/article/n...-investigation
Last edited by Jaywalker; 04-13-2019 at 10:14 PM.
Did she leave?Originally Posted by Trooper224
I was talking to a colleague of mine who is a SWO. After his comments about the tangible failures that lead to these events I can't blame you for feeling that way. It really put things in perspective for me...….like how an entire generation of SWOs were taught ship operations from a CD on self-study time instead of actually driving and operating ships.
"Are you ready? Okay. Let's roll."- Last words of Todd Beamer
She's signed up for one more enlistment and then she'll finish out in the reserves.
We may lose and we may win, but we will never be here again.......
NTSB has released their report on the McCain collision. I'm still reading through, but so far it's most interesting. Links to two articles, and the report itself:
https://news.usni.org/2019/08/06/nts...cain-collision
https://news.usni.org/2019/08/06/nts...-off-singapore
https://assets.documentcloud.org/doc...99/MAR1901.pdf
The US Navy will replace its touchscreen controls with mechanical ones on its destroyers - The Verge
I suppose digital, touchscreen controls seemed like a good idea at the time...On August 21st, 2017, the USS John S. McCain collided with the Alnic MC, a Liberian oil tanker, off the coast of Singapore. The report provides a detailed overview of the actions that led to the collision: when crew members tried to split throttle and steering control between consoles, they lost control of the ship, putting it into the path of the tanker. The crash killed 10 sailors and injured 48 aboard the McCain.
The report says that while fatigue and lack of training played a role in the accident, the design of the ship’s control console were also contributing factors. Located in the middle of the McCain’s bridge, the Ship’s Control Console (SCC) features a pair of touch-screens on both the Helm and Lee Helm stations, through which the crew could steer and propel the ship. Investigators found that the crew had placed it in “backup manual mode,” which removed computer-assisted help, because it allowed for “more direct form of communication between steering and the SSC.” That setting meant that any crew member at another station could take over steering operations, and when the crew tried to regain control of the ship from multiple stations, control “shifted from the lee helm, to aft steering, to the helm, and back to aft steering.”
Last edited by Drang; 08-12-2019 at 12:44 PM.
Recovering Gun Store Commando. My Blog: The Clue Meter
“It doesn’t matter what the problem is, the solution is always for us to give the government more money and power, while we eat less meat.”
Glenn Reynolds
Recovering Gun Store Commando. My Blog: The Clue Meter
“It doesn’t matter what the problem is, the solution is always for us to give the government more money and power, while we eat less meat.”
Glenn Reynolds
I know, this is true necroing of a necro thread. It's worth reading and not too long if you're looking for a smart guy's take on how well the Navy has done at solving the systemic problems that contributed to the collisions. There's a chart in the article that doesn't cut and paste to the excerpt.
https://cdrsalamander.substack.com/p...-were-lying-to
"Follow through. For some things, that is what matters … and the numbers tell the story.
So, here we are over six years, roughly one-and-a-half the time it took for the USA to fight WWII - after the drowning deaths of 17 Sailors in the collisions of the destroyers FITZGERALD and MCCAIN in WESTPAC that, we were told, was going to be a turning point for our Navy to really - and we meant it this time - refocus on the fundamentals that we failed to maintain which were - outside the ultimate responsibilities of command - the latent causes of the collisions; manning, maintenance, and training..."
"...Here we are, halfway through May of 2023, and we’re still talking about the events.
Thanks to navalist twitter datahound and reader of all congressional thingys Charlie B, … let’s cut to the chase.
From the recent INSURV report.
Compared to that horribilis annus of 2017, how have we done?
Besides Electrical, Medical, and Supply - we are worse.
As someone who spent WAY too much time in the readiness/material condition reporting world, there are one of two reasons for this.
1. In 2017 we just has systemic lying on readiness reports, but since then we’ve stopped that and with the billions of dollars and seabags full of Sailor sweat, we now have more accurate reporting, but it just appears lower compared to the Potemkin readiness reporting in 2017.
2. We really don’t care. After some nice reports and a few somber faces to the camera and the odd funeral or 17 … as an institution we regressed to the mean, only worse now.
#1 I can accept, but for me to accept this, I need a few things; confession, your math, repentance, accountability.
As we have not seen the first and second, only passive hints at the third, and sacrificial bits of the fourth, I’m afraid we have to assume #2 represents 50.1% of the reason.
Why? Why would this be?
Ask yourself; has leadership and Congress been focused on maintenance? Have you seen a surge of shore support? Have we systemically changed our mindset (outside a few specific areas)? What are our incentives and disincentives changing to bring about different results?..."
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