OT: The destroyer Fitzgerald's collision with a container vessel

[tlfamm]

A recent, highly readable account of the destroyer USS Fitzgerald's collision with the container ship MV Crystal off of the coast of Japan in June 2017. A disturbing tale of missing organizational cohesion, loss of distributed command oversight, over-reliance on malfunctioning/maladjusted/misunderstood radar systems, lack of applied basic seamanship, etc. Ship and crew were simply not ready to leave port - but were under orders to do so. The mishap cost the lives of 7 US sailors, and injured 3.



This is a _long_ read (at least 60 minutes), but a completely absorbing one:

https://features.propublica.org/navy...crash-crystal/


The damaged Fitzgerald:




And a (shorter) Wikipedia article on the collision:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Fi...stal_collision

[A.K. Boomer]

I wonder if that awkward looking top plate was put on after they had to cut into an area that might be otherwise inaccessible.

like maybe they had to use it to retrieve bodies and then just put a patch lid back on after the fact ?

[SteveF]

I wonder if that awkward looking top plate was put ............

You mean the light colored one near the top that looks just like the one on the port side? I'm guessing not.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Fi...-TX154-258.jpg

Steve

[J Tiers]

The white item should be a phased array presumably for radar.

[A.K. Boomer]

You mean the light colored one near the top that looks just like the one on the port side? I'm guessing not.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Fi...-TX154-258.jpg

Steve

Weeeel that pretty much blows that theory out of the water - overactive imagination again, just did not look like it "belonged"

[Mcgyver]

Amazing that there a transport ship that can just pick it up and bring it home.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/F...LR483-047).JPG

[A.K. Boomer]

Right song - wrong ship...

https://youtu.be/9vST6hVRj2A

[wierdscience]

Amazing that there a transport ship that can just pick it up and bring it home.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/F...LR483-047).JPG

Saw it in person when they brought the USS Cole home to Pascagoula.As I understand it there are also much bigger versions as well.

[old mart]

If there's any lesson to be learnt from this, it is to have enough Mk1 eyeballs on duty when in busy shipping lanes rather than rely on radar.

[J Tiers]

If there's any lesson to be learnt from this, it is to have enough Mk1 eyeballs on duty when in busy shipping lanes rather than rely on radar.

And don't issue order to rush through. And, presumably, stay on the bridge, it's your ship..... Then nobody has to worry if they should wake you up or not.

I saw that a day or so back, and it looked as if there wa blame enough for all levels.