USS Fitzgerald collision

GTX

All hail the God of Frustration!!!
Staff member
Senior Member
Joined
15 April 2006
Messages
6,766
Reaction score
8,003
Website
beyondthesprues.com
Shocking: https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2019/01/14/the-ghost-in-the-fitzs-machine-why-a-doomed-warships-crew-never-saw-the-vessel-that-hit-it/
 
Jesus. This is worse than the crap you'd hear about the Soviet fleet back in the day. :eek: :mad:
 
The excuses offered for the JOs failing a Rules of the Road quiz are embarrassingly bad. If your knowledge is so poorly embedded that you can forget it after a couple of weeks, for practical purposes you do not have that knowledge at all. It needs to be instinctive, so that you do the right thing when stressed or fatigued.

I seriously think that they need to look at breaking the SWO field into specialized lanes for ship handlers, combat systems supervisors, and engineers. It's obvious that the current SWO pipeline is not producing officers who can perform competently in all three sub-disciplines.
 
Thought this was posted already, oh well. Via Cdr Salamander: https://features.propublica.org/navy-accidents/uss-fitzgerald-destroyer-crash-crystal/

Follow on article: https://features.propublica.org/navy-accidents/us-navy-crashes-japan-cause-mccain/
 
This is a good perspective take from a defense journalist who served as a watchstander once upon a time.

https://link.defensenews.com/view/5bc9db3b9fbbe41d887e82d79hw4a.te/2e05c562
 
Be interesting to see if they actually follow through on this.
 
Possibly this needs doing, it's certainly a more intuitive interface that anyone can grasp in an emergency, and ISTR the leaked report (can't find it just now) mentions the senior PO on the bridge having to replace the seaman at either the wheel or engine controls in the middle of the attempted evasion, but it doesn't deal with the proximate cause of the accident, which was the Fitzgerald's dysfunctional command staff, and poor crew training, meaning they were incapable of maintaining proper situational awareness in a busy sealane.
 
Last edited:

Similar threads

Back
Top Bottom