USS Fitzgerald collision in C7F

[AllAmerican75]

Let's talk about what actually happened and not a false dichotomy of some fictitious qualified OOD who can ace a written exam but can't apply those skills on watch just that you made up to try to prove a point. What is actually going on is that the SWO community is routinely putting people on watch who have inadequate knowledge to be there.

No, I think you've missed the point. These two ships had all the resources necessary to ensure their wardrooms were experts at applying the rules of the road. You want to point to other issues discovered in the comprehensive review then great, but let's not pretend like they caused the collisions.

Dude, I'm speaking from experience of what I've seen as a Surface Warfare Officer and what I know to be true about the community. I think we're just going to have to agree to disagree here.

The issue was there was no requirement for them to be out there. The ship was already qualified. The aviation crews were already qualified (done separately through their own syllabus), and the ship and aviation crews were already qualified to work together (also done through their own syllabus). ATG just seemed to be there to "observe and make sure we were doing it right," but if we did something wrong, ATG had no authority to "un-qual" us.
Again, made extra special when they would talk about doing something during the in-brief and we (the aviation crews) would explain that's not a) how it actually would happen and b) how it's not legally allowed to be conducted.
Like I said, it was just weird.

This is not uncommon in the SWO world. My ship was certified to deploy with a waiver for astern refueling since A) we would never do it while deployed to 4th Fleet AOR, B) were never a high enough priority to warrant a tanker, and C) it's an incredibly dangerous evolution for little tactical gain. A week before we were set to deploy, a tanker was diverted to Mayport for something or other unrelated to us, we then were informed that ATG had the waiver rescinded and we were going to perform the astern refueling the day we were set to deploy. We literally did the tasking with ATG on board as we made our way down to the Caribbean. It was insane. This all goes back to the fact that the standards are fluid, most have not had a serious review in over a decade, and even ATG squabbles over how to apply them. It's a cultural thing.

 

[Max the Mad Russian]

to remove EDOs from most ships to go back to a model similar to most other nations where there are actual engineers running the engineering department

As usually, there are pros and cons. Since (as I PM'd) there is a huge industry supporting USN maintenance maybe this is a proper way for URL SWO corps to run the ENG dept and divs within but it certainly diverts SWO JOs from tactical expertise. As it has been wrote in this topic the quals and certs are not the real knowlege. Aside from it, avoiding collisions at sea is not even tactical thing from purely naval standpoint, this is general maritime pool of skills wider than naval realm. No one merchant marine service or company in the whole world maintains the compulsory practice to merge or alternate Deck and Engineering jobs along the merchant mariners' career path. Clearly, the USN carrier leadership practice sticks with the same divided approach: no NA/NFOs who run the whole aircraft carrier as a ship have at least marginal time within the carrier's nuclear and/or engineering bowels and no SWOs and SWO(N)s with carrier experience can sit in the carrier's CO/XO chair on the bridge. Of course, the carrier's way of maneuvering at sea is quite simplier than DDG's but seamanship is seamanship and it is always better to have the good shipdriver on the bridge and good engineer in the machinery space knowing their respective jobs will be done with confidence and mastery, right?

 

[Gatordev]

A week before we were set to deploy, a tanker was diverted to Mayport for something or other unrelated to us, we then were informed that ATG had the waiver rescinded and we were going to perform the astern refueling the day we were set to deploy.

This is meant as more rhetorical and not arguing your overall valid point(s)... But what if you had "failed" the evolution? Would you have been turned around? And your case, at least the waiver was covering something specifically related to USN procedures and standards (however fluid they may be).

What I couldn't figure out with our evolution was that we weren't even being graded in a readiness kind of way. If ATG hadn't liked the way we did something, I'm not sure if they could have even administratively done anything since they don't conduct the training or manage the quals. I'm sure they could make it painful for a couple of days between the ship and DESRON. I think we were chuckling during the whole event because we were trying to figure out if they could even recognize a failure to follow procedures. It would have been an interesting experiment just to see what would have happened. Again, we seem to be arguing the same thing from different sides. BLUF: Shoes are weird.

B) were never a high enough priority to warrant a tanker

Never assume! I did two deployments where we UNREP'ed in the AOR. The first was just when coming back up to San Diego (not sure if we were still even in C4F) but the other deployment we UNREP'ed several times on station ISO of a specific case. It was interesting to see the resources that were put in place when it was important enough.

 

[AllAmerican75]

This is meant as more rhetorical and not arguing your overall valid point(s)... But what if you had "failed" the evolution? Would you have been turned around? And your case, at least the waiver was covering something specifically related to USN procedures and standards (however fluid they may be).

There is no way they would have convinced COMNAVSO or CTF-80 to turn us around because we couldn't successfully conduct astern refueling. We heading South come hell or high water because we had a mission to do and a USCG LEDET on board to do it. If ATG had thrown a fit, there would have been multiple four stars raining hell down upon them for screwing up deployment schedules.

Never assume! I did two deployments where we UNREP'ed in the AOR. The first was just when coming back up to San Diego (not sure if we were still even in C4F) but the other deployment we UNREP'ed several times on station ISO of a specific case. It was interesting to see the resources that were put in place when it was important enough.

Honestly, it's a pretty safe bet. I was on a PC, and refueling at sea like we just isn't tactically viable. We may be able to get fuel to extend the ship out past a week or so, but we'll still run out of food. The best method is to perform lightering which nobody has really figured out how to do in our risk averse organization. There's a tacmemo floating around but it's only been performed once and apparently it did not go so well.

Of course, the carrier's way of maneuvering at sea is quite simplier than DDG's but seamanship is seamanship and it is always better to have the good shipdriver on the bridge and good engineer in the machinery space knowing their respective jobs will be done with confidence and mastery, right?

Our EDOs run the maintenance of ships in the yards with SWOs just doing minimal supervision and management. All of the contracting and planning is performed by an EDO somewhere. I think we definitely need to split the career path for SWOs so some can become very competent engineers and others can be competent ship drivers but I don't think we'll be able to convince Congress to shoehorn very expensive EDOs into the shipboard engineering pipeline. I think the optimal design puts an O5 engineering SWO into the CHENG role with an O5 CO and an O4 XO. This would solve the problem of having an engineering career pipeline and the power struggles inherent in the CO/XO fleet-up model.

 

[Gatordev]

Honestly, it's a pretty safe bet. I was on a PC, and refueling at sea like we just isn't tactically viable.

Ah, I thought this was when you were on the FFG. Makes sense.

 

[Max the Mad Russian]

I think the optimal design puts an O5 engineering SWO into the CHENG role

Suppose SWO(N) O-5 instead of his/her tour as FFG/DDG CO. All in all, after this tour s/he will play nuke toys on a CV with roughly the same amount of people (in both RM and RP divs) and then you will possess real engineering expert afloat.

 

[BigRed389]

Our EDOs run the maintenance of ships in the yards with SWOs just doing minimal supervision and management. All of the contracting and planning is performed by an EDO somewhere. I think we definitely need to split the career path for SWOs so some can become very competent engineers and others can be competent ship drivers but I don't think we'll be able to convince Congress to shoehorn very expensive EDOs into the shipboard engineering pipeline. I think the optimal design puts an O5 engineering SWO into the CHENG role with an O5 CO and an O4 XO. This would solve the problem of having an engineering career pipeline and the power struggles inherent in the CO/XO fleet-up model.

EDOs aren't really more expensive than SWOs, when the SWO community throws Grad Ed opportunity at JOs as a retention incentive.

If you use the Commonwealth Navy model, you basically split off ship material readiness into its own distinct career path with sea/shore billets.
The advantages are obvious, when you are in a position to make decisions ashore, as you're going to have to rather immediately live with the decisions you made when you return to sea. And it makes it an actual career path, because they have a viable track after DH tours all the way through Flag billets. The downside is that it almost over specializes...they will have billets filled by an "Engineering Officer" but are split between Mechanical and Weapons Engineers. This starts to become a problem the higher up you go, because at some point, it gets too top heavy to have one of each in an organization.

The challenge in splitting off engineering while still keeping it within "SWO" is it kills off traditional advancement in their career path. It would require a significant change in how the SWO force is managed.
There's also the other question of how it fits with having LDOs/CWOs on ships. Most LDO/CWO Principal Assistants are a significant cut above in maintenance organization knowledge relative to both Senior Enlisted and Line Officers. To be really simplistic about it, in terms of what they do, the Engineer Officers doing sea tours on RN ships basically is what would happen if you took a LDO/CWO and made them a DH (with Deputies and Assistants that are more junior Engineer Officers to serve as Division Officers). When they rotate ashore, they do what USN EDO's do in the maintenance and acquisition roles.

 

[BigRed389]

In the 'swiss cheese' model or 'switch' model, the OOD has his own hole or switch. You can put the CO in there, but that's only available if he's called in time.

The CO isn't even what I'm looking at. There were several other watchstanders and material readiness owners (from the Chief's Mess up to the Wardroom, and out to the N43 organizations ashore) who failed in their (pretty fucking simple) duties that could have been the single point to prevent this issue.

That's not what the Comprehensive Review says on page 13:

"Primary causes of the collision were leaderships’ loss of situational awareness in a high traffic area and failure to follow safe navigational practices, coupled with watchstanders who were not proficient with steering control operations or engineering casualty response procedures. "

Well, no shit. Pretty much every collision involves leadership loss of situational awareness and unsafe navigation practices. That's like a Conduct Unbecoming charge...thrown on top of the more specific problem. Which is literally in the second half of the same sentence. They didn't lose SA or do anything unsafe....right until they ordered the helmsman to do something that a trained and experienced helmsman would be expected to know how to do, and (effectively, not technically) lost steering and propulsion control.

Because the Navy doesn't have the money (or the need) to pay an entirely full crew of sailors to sit in drydock, so it relies on ships cross-decking sailors to operational units. This is only a problem when you have a ship (or community?) that blazes off qualification cards and puts people on watch without adequately ensuring they understand the systems they are operating.

The cross deck isn't the point. The issue is that when it happened, whatever it was was so important that it had to happen without providing enough time for the sailor(s) to get properly trained and qualified on the system.
From: https://www.navytimes.com/news/your...-were-not-qualified-to-be-on-watch-navy-says/

"That’s because multiple members of the bridge team on watch at the time of the collision were temporarily assigned from the cruiser Antietam and had never officially qualified to operate the bridge equipment on board McCain.
The report noted that the differences between the two ship’s steering systems were significant, but none of the watch-standers were given any training to learn the new system."

Of course there is. I never claimed otherwise. But they're not the root causes of the collisions. This is akin to discovering that someone has unpaid parking tickets when investigating a murder allegation. If the first response about these collisions is about how the ships were screwed by the man for not having enough time to train on the RoR or that their goat lockers were all jacked up, the salient lessons learned are being lost.

You're basically saying "try harder" to a community over-tasked and under-resourced. All line communities share the problem, but until ship CO's can start saying no to senior leadership, this will continue to be a problem. Nukes have the nuclear and SUBSAFE cards. Aviation has the whole "planes falling out of the sky" thing. If JSM's CO had pushed back to say they were concerned about needing time to train up the cross decked helmsmen, how well do you think that would have been received prior to these incidents? And while systems become both more capable and complex, we are only making deeper cuts to Sailor training.

 

[DanMa1156]

This is the key problem in the Surface Navy. The mindset has been that of perfection and a refusal to tell Congress "No!" for so long that it's rotted the culture of the community. COs and officers can't make mistakes and can't ever be honest about their actual ability to get underway or meet some tasking. Crews and wardrooms are run ragged and then expected to recover on shore duty. We play shell games with parts and personnel to ensure that ships can get a top score on INSURV and pre-deployment certifications and then gut them immediately afterwards to get the next ship to pass. And really, no ship will actually fail to meet training standards because that would put too much stress on the Fleet due to missed deployments. We simply cannot continue to operate in the manner that we do but Lord forbid anyone ever be honest.

Now having about a half year's worth of experience on an operational staff, I can say I do not think this mentality is exclusive to the Surface Navy. I will say that certain maintenance periods are protected very well, but as a whole, we continue to accept missions that break people and equipment. The fact that we have certain ships less than a decade old that have some pretty terrible CASREPS is telling. Hornet readiness is a shell game and it's not like the rest of Naval Aviation is a shining star of readiness either if you look beyond what's said in DRRS-N. Subs are writing checks into the future too. It's an entire Navy problem. And it isn't just at the O-5 CO level. On my staff, our response to tasking always starts with "yes, but x and y are the costs to the short term tasking that will result in benefit z." I have seen our superior staff so far change his/her mind on only one occasion thus far and only because a) the tasked asset was completely inappropriate to address the threat, and b) we got another asset by way of deployment extension to relieve said asset.

 

[AllAmerican75]

EDOs aren't really more expensive than SWOs, when the SWO community throws Grad Ed opportunity at JOs as a retention incentive.

Is this taking into account the DAWIA and LEAN-Six-Sigma training and certs? I always figured that added to our costs. All that stuff is certainly expensive in the civilian world.

There's also the other question of how it fits with having LDOs/CWOs on ships. Most LDO/CWO Principal Assistants are a significant cut above in maintenance organization knowledge relative to both Senior Enlisted and Line Officers. To be really simplistic about it, in terms of what they do, the Engineer Officers doing sea tours on RN ships basically is what would happen if you took a LDO/CWO and made them a DH (with Deputies and Assistants that are more junior Engineer Officers to serve as Division Officers). When they rotate ashore, they do what USN EDO's do in the maintenance and acquisition roles.

I honestly hadn't considered our LDO/CWO cousins. Maybe we should just admit that our engineering departments are so intricate that we need to just have LDOs in charge of them. We already do it on big decks and PCs, may as well do it in the rest of the Fleet.

Maintenance and Manpower Management is an All Navy problem.

I don't disagree. I saw the same thing with ships and subs in Naples. Getting the right assets to all of the places we needed them was a constant juggling act with deployment extensions being handed out like candy. I honestly can't speak about the aviation side because I never really got to see behind the curtain with them.

 

[Max the Mad Russian]

Maybe we should just admit that our engineering departments are so intricate that we need to just have LDOs in charge of them

Do LDOs have the special graduate electrical-mechanical education? Royal Navy Marine Engineers usually have a tech degree (general degree is compulsory), as well as Weapons Engineers too. From the educational standpoint, it is rather British shipdrivers (Warfare Officers) are equal to LDOs since they usually have no degree, just high school cert.

 

[BigRed389]

Is this taking into account the DAWIA and LEAN-Six-Sigma training and certs? I always figured that added to our costs. All that stuff is certainly expensive in the civilian world.

DAWIA comes out of US Government overhead. The overall Acq workforce is much, much larger than the uniformed component (and that includes all Navy, to include AEDOs, Supply Officers, etc.). Other than the time you spend on it (and remember, active duty overtime is cheap...) it's not very expensive.

Lean Six Sigma is the same...funded out of USN overhead.

I honestly hadn't considered our LDO/CWO cousins. Maybe we should just admit that our engineering departments are so intricate that we need to just have LDOs in charge of them. We already do it on big decks and PCs, may as well do it in the rest of the Fleet.

The thing is, Platform Engineering ISN'T intricate. Engines, pumps, and other Mechanical systems are pretty simple, and SYSCOM procedures for maintaining those systems are meant to be followed to the letter. What they are is time consuming to keep operational at 100% so you don't degrade away redundancy or full capability.
It's the Combat side that is complex. It's just that ships with HM&E issues don't leave the pier at all, while Combat and Weapons issues don't always get the same visibility because only the most critical casualties (e.g. full radar loss) trip major redlines.

Do LDOs have the special graduate electrical-mechanical education? Royal Navy Marine Engineers usually have a tech degree (general degree is compulsory), as well as Weapons Engineers too. From the educational standpoint, it is rather British shipdrivers (Warfare Officers) are equal to LDOs since they usually have no degree, just high school cert.

No, LDO's are experienced technicians who are commissioned. However, their technical system knowledge (as well as Navy procedure) is almost always far in excess of anything Line Officers possess (which they should...they commission with usually a decade or more of enlisted experience).

I don't need a graduate degree educated engineer on every ship to keep a weapons system running. If your car needed a graduate degree to be able to work on it, it'd be a pretty badly thought out car.

 

[Max the Mad Russian]

However, their technical system knowledge (as well as Navy procedure) is almost always far in excess of anything Line Officers possess

By what means, considering SWO LDOs? Which special school at? I understand fairness of such opinion for nuke LDOs who at least pass a year in Naval Reactors edu installations but what about the others? Tech system knowledge couldn't be an outcome of training, it needs education I'm sure. Not only what's happening (training) but why it's happening (education)? According to ADM Holloway III memoirs, carriers' CHENGs during his tenure as CNO were almost always LDOs (except for two CVNs existed then, USS Enterprise and USS Nimitz) and material readiness of the carrier fleet was extremely poor. His choice was to assign URL SWO O-5s fresh from CHENG cruiser tours to a similar tour on non-nuclear carriers with promises to return them to CRUDES world as O-6 COs of the same CGs, while for two noted nuclear carriers the new CHENGs were sent from nuclear submarines (along with reactor DHs). Maybe Holloway as career NA had paid little attention to a real situation but his respect to LDO SWO corps was indeed very moderate.

If your car needed a graduate degree to be able to work on it, it'd be a pretty badly thought out car.

Any surface ship is far more intricate tech system than a car. Remember a fairy tale of vanilla ice cream?

 

[HAL Pilot]

LDOs are technical experts by way of experience, not a university. They have many USN schools on various pieces of equipment or systems but so does all the enlisted and officers.

So yes, technical expertise gained through training, not formal education.

 

[BigRed389]

By what means, considering SWO LDOs? Which special school at? I understand fairness of such opinion for nuke LDOs who at least pass a year in Naval Reactors edu installations but what about the others? Tech system knowledge couldn't be an outcome of training, it needs education I'm sure. According to ADM Holloway III memoirs, carriers' CHENGs during his tenure as CNO were almost always LDOs (except for two CVNs existed then, USS Enterprise and USS Nimitz) and material readiness of the carrier fleet was extremely poor. His choice was to assign SWO O-5s fresh from CHENG cruiser tours to a similar tour on non-nuclear carriers with promises to return them to CRUDES world as O-6 COs of the same CGs, while for two noted nuclear carriers the new CHENGs were sent from nuclear submarines (along with reactor DHs). Maybe Holloway as career NA had paid little attention to a real situation but his respect to LDO SWO corps was indeed very moderate.

I've been a rider/assessor/whatever on many ships.
The electronics and ordnance LDO's have almost always been very sharp and on top of their programs and material readiness.
I don't have the same level of experience to have that confidence with Engineering LDO's.

Any surface ship is far more intricate tech system than a car.

So are combat airplanes. Still worked on by kids with high school educations with the rest filled in by the Navy.
Aviation's AEDO's aren't in charge of material readiness at the squadron level, they manage readiness at the program level.
Same for the Surface and Sub EDO's.