USS John S. McCain - Collision in Singapore

How can you fight a ship if you can't prevent collisions during routine patrol. The big picture (4 collisions this year) troubles me.

Carl, I went to make this post and my pc went to administration and debugging screens (lines of code). I had to close my browser to exit. Don't have a clue how I got there.

Same Japanese home port??

I know of the one incident at the Japanese port, and then the latest one near Singapore,...very large distance between those 2 ports, and 2 different countries involved.?

Thanks for the heads up Walt. I'll try to duplicate.

I decide last night to look at more details on the Japanese incident. Basically it appears as though the container ship was on autopilot (and maybe without proper crew on the bridge as is often reported on some of these ships).

STRANGE, appears the container ship captain is lying.

For reference:

I was not speaking of the ship's homeports, but rather where the accidents occurred.

Its really a shame that we lost Subic Bay as a homeport over there, particularly with this looming problem in the South China Sea

Billions of dollars to build. Hundreds of crew. Unlimited operating budget. And they can't drive around without getting into a collision with another vessel?

vesselfinder.com released a video of the tanker AIS track. If the map and widely reported time of collision (05h24 local) are correct the collision happened inside a TSS zone.

Crossing a TSS, in traffic, at night, What could possibly go wrong?

Given the damage on port it seems they tried to to pass behind TEAM OSLO (~11knots) but in font of 3 ships that were roughly abreast at the time of collision. Managed to pass in front of GUANG ZHO WAN ~11.6 knots. got hit by ALNIC MC ~10knots, never reached HYUNDAI GLOBAL ~16.4knots.

Edit: Port damage, fixed ship names accordingly.

The US Navy is perhaps going to have to rethink its policy on AIS, particularly when navigating in heavily trafficked seas or shipping channels, exactly like the conditions found in the Straits of Malacca.

I don't have any experience with the commercial autopilot systems, but I understand some more recent models have AIS integrated collision avoidance systems. If that's true, would this have been preventable if the US ship had been pinging on AIS?

NO, but I remember now, where's the PM in this forum?

What I have read is that changes in the Navy career culture are a big issue. Career advancement is coming from opportunities in Naval aviator positions, submarines and special forces. The time and skill on the bridge deck is somehow becoming de-emphasized.

The current process of on-ship duty rotation is putting young unskilled navigators in decision making positions that they have not been properly trained for or given sufficient. experience. Picture a kid getting an assignment from the Helo Deck, then rotating to some Machinery Handling position then rotating to the Bridge and you are now a "navigator'. The buzz word for the future is reduced manning, etc. Technology will save your butt. But why not have the navigators as trainees for 6 - 12 months on station (or at least one rotation) before they start calling the shots in their respective areas of responsibility? This is how other Navies approach the skill positions on the Bridge Deck.

Also read from other past US sailors that the approach to ship ops in nighttime transition in high traffic areas has changed. In the past, everyone was put on alert, Helo Stations were manned and at ready, navigation through high traffic straits was done at the most alert readiness possible, near combat alertness onboard the ship. This has changed to more of a cruise ship style approach. How's that working out now? Young men and women dying in their bunks, what a tragedy. The base in Japan needs a complete overhaul from top to bottom and less emphasis on technology and more emphasis on well trained "resources" otherwise known as humans.

Not just Navy culture and not new. Every time the military needs something, they have to cut somewhere to get the money. Reduced manpower is always a big target, especially when trying to justify automation. People are supposed to be able to do more jobs, fewer people for a given task, and then commanders have to figure out how. I had a Wing Commander try to fly us 16-on, 8-off, it didn't go well.

Now the experienced commander who has his fingers and toes in all the leaks is getting kicked aside, so a new guy can come in and try to reinvent the wheel. Maybe he'll find a way, or maybe he'll be taken seriously when he says it can't be done safely. Then they'll cut somewhere else and the process will repeat.

x2...if we suddenly found ourselves at war with another country with similar abilities and weapons, an operator in a missile control room simply pushes a button and takes out any billion dollar ship as a target. Our Navy fleet works in these small war/police actions we have been involved in for decades. There are probably weapons to take out nuclear subs.