Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Seven Sailors lost today. YGBSM

an alert bridge couldn't out turn a 504 foot barge? someone was not watching.
though i knew a Boat captain once that had a taste for weed and coke.

As usual, no shortage of numbnut comments on this topic.

I don't know. All I read was the container ship made an unexpected turn. The turn seems inexplicable. Yes those DDGs can turn and turn fast, but without the full picture and given the traffic density, there might be mitigating circumstances.

On the Mark 5 that my Son Captains they had a computer go haywire.

The boat went from dead still to max speed,i think they said something like 80 knots.
It t-boned another boat and all but two crewmen had to be flown to the hospital.

My Son saved his boat from sinking and drove it back to base,when he got there he was asked why he was limping,he had broke his ankle and had a large divot in his thigh.

The others were injured worse.
So yep sometimes computers do go awol.

YOKOSUKA, Japan — Navy divers found the bodies of missing sailors Sunday aboard the stricken USS Fitzgerald that collided with a container ship in the busy sea off Japan, the Navy said.


Searchers gained access to the spaces that were damaged during the collision and brought the remains to Naval Hospital Yokosuka where they will be identified, the Navy said in a statement. Seven sailors had been missing.
what a heart break.

RIP sailors!
Prayers sent for their souls, and on their families behalf.

There should be no reason for a collision to occur, short of mechanical failure. But with all due respect, for all the arm chair quarterbacks here that have never driven a 550 foot long 8,000 ton ship in a constrained water way, surrounded by unpredictable mariners in the dark of the night, you have no idea what you're talking about.

Im pretty certain we will be given a perfectly logical and reasonable excu, uh, explanation. Just by luck it doesnt happen more often.

I do hope the cause was something that made the accident unavoidable on our servicemens part. Sometimes Murphys Law takes control and chitt just happens.

+1

Too many Paint-chippers on their hands and knees and not enough on watch.

May the sailors rest in peace and their families consoled.

I do. Edited to add, I want to know the backgrounds of the entire Bridge Team on that freighter.....

Very Good Point

You should have ended your post at the first sentence. To allow an vessel with unknown intentions to approach and strike a USN ship calls for an immediate JAG review. How vulnerable was the Fitzgerald to a terrorist attack?
And no, I don't need to have navigated a USN ship in order to express my disapproval.

I would like to see the paths of the two ships. I expect the bridge team on the destroyer is going to come under more scrutiny than that of the freighter. Although if someone on a freighter made a plan to ram a USN destroyer on the open ocean, it was a very ambitious plan.

Sycamore

Hell, its nothing to do with Christian, even some of us, wait to pass judgement. Unless its a muslim....

There's going to be plenty of guilt to go around. I've got many years experience on the bridge from helmsman and lookout to QMOW and Conn. Been the XO and had command. There's probably a chain of mistakes that allowed this to occur, but it shouldn't have and there is no acceptable excuse. The captain is at fault and the investigation will bear that out. He has the ultimate responsibility for the safety of his ship. PERIOD! It's a heart breaking tragedy, nonetheless.

That's the end of a whole bunch of officer's careers. As it should be. Hopefully someone gives them this as a parting gift:

https://www.amazon.com/Avoid-Huge-S...=8-1&keywords=how+to+avoid+big+ships

(read the reviews)

Agreed. All the way around. The responsibility of the CO on a Navy ship underway is hard to imagine. They are responsible for every life and every outcome.

Tragic news in some households this week that's for sure
I'm hoping by some chance it was an unavoidable accident. I'm sure there were some good people on that Navy ship, I hate to see lives ruined.

Birdwatcher