I think you’ll find the porter’s damage is different due to the bow shape of the vessel it collided (a ULCC) and the slow speed of the vessel it collided with. Though it will remain to be seen how different the relative speeds in the two collisions are.
Yes, I happened to notice that too 
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Captain Konrad is spot on as usual, and if any corrections need to be made he his more than willing. His goal from what I have learned from him is a commitment to providing the facts. Bravo ZULU Cap.
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The COLREGS aren’t that simple. There is no such thing as “right of way” on the water and it is the duty of all vessels at all times to avoid collisions.
It is also possible that this was an overtaking situation and the destroyer was the stand on vessel, which makes them less at fault.
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Sleep? When I was underway that was the one thing we were always short on. With Condition III steaming I was standing 4 hours as JOOD on the bridge out of every 12 hours (4 on, 8 off). Outside of bridge time I had my regular division officer duties to attend to, drills to participate in, etc. If I got more than 4 hours sleep on a given night it was a luxury.
The other items you list, yes, I agree with from my experience in the USN. I’ve not spent any time on merchant ships so I can’t speak to what they do or don’t have.
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That sounds awefully a lot like the life of a Merchant Ship’s Deck Officer. The only difference is you’ve got, what 16(?), watchful eyes up on the bridge, while we’ve generally got 4. 6 if the captain’s hanging out.
Shortly before a new big ship is delivered to the owners the yard is required by various rules and classification societies to execute just that during the sea trial. Owners reps are on board as well, Captain and C/E in any case because they are doing this crash test only once and nobody really likes it. The ship is not yet handed over, still property of the yard. So the empty vessel under ballast runs full ahead and it’s huge 8 m dia. propeller trashes the water. On a given command the maneuvering handle is pulled from full ahead to full astern. A procedure is started which is not interrupted by man. The fuel supply stops immediately but the momentum of the ship keeps the propeller turning ahead until a certain revolution which might be 30 % of Full is reached. In order to fully stop the engine which is absolutely necessary to move the cams air is blown into the cylinders to further stop the piston movement. Then a reverse start is executed which mostly fails because the drag on the propeller is still strong from the forward moving vessel. A second start with more air and more fuel is initiated by the automatic and if they are lucky the motor starts firing in reverse. In the meantime the ships has moved a considerable way which might be measured in miles, not in yards. In the real life you will probably get a black out because the automatically starting backup generators will not synchronize and you run out of air. Under test condition every station is manned like on a warship…
Just read through the Facebook comments for John’s Editorial myself. A lot of critical comments from the peanut gallery of the Navy-crowd. I wanted to say it was a great article, I don’t feel like it was an improper time to release it, and I generally agree with the jist of it. I think you ended it with “both are at fault”, because 1) it’s technically true, and 2) if you said the USS Fitz was to blame, as the title suggested, the navy crowd would really spit-roast you. I felt in the comments that you got a lot of flak from those unfamiliar with your experience. You possibly could have done a better job qualifying yourself as an expert on the matter. Otherwise it was a great article and I hope to see more coverage of this incident.
There has been so much mis-information on this incident in the mainstream media, that the general public, instead of learning more about how USN and MM ships operate, probably just became dumber and even more out of touch with the realities of what we do.
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The title of the article was pure “click bait”. Why speculate until the facts are out anyway? Worse than cable news…
The TSS is interesting.
Suggests Navy should have expected the Crystal’s Port turn.
And that Navy might have been in the wrong lane.
Given the discussion so far: auto pilot, differential bridge manning, differential speed capability the probability that the merchant ship was over taking is pretty small.
Sorry about using “right of way” vice stand on and burdened. Haven’t talked in this domain for awhile.
ELTON C. "JEFF” OBYRNE
9802-12 Baymeadows Rd
PMB#179
Jacksonville, Florida
32256-7987
910-545-5768
obyrnejeff@mac.com
This is not a voice radio procedures event. Had either ship had adequate situational awareness, voice radio might have come into play, but they didn’t so radio didn’t play. Second, one thousand yards is half a nautical mile. Transposing the distance into meters doesn’t make it any more intelligible.
Although I’m not current on USN standards, it needs to be understood that their philosophy of ship handling fits their environment: many ships maneuvering at close quarters and high speed. That this requires a larger bridge team is part of the cost of doing business. That the OOD must then exercise crew resource management to keep his bridge ‘quiet and dark’ is just another qualification element to be trained. My experience, as ships company and passenger, indicated to me that the underway qualification was the most important element of an officer’s training. The divisional responsibilities were left to be accomplished by the divisional leading petty officer. In an organization the size of the USN, training is a process not a project. The constant stream of newbies joining the ship must be integrated and trained in the ship’s procedures and missions. They then move on in a relatively short period of time. That this generates significant numbers of under instruction folks on the bridge or deck plates is again a cost of doing this kind of business.
ELTON C. "JEFF” OBYRNE
9802-12 Baymeadows Rd
PMB#179
Jacksonville, Florida
32256-7987
910-545-5768
obyrnejeff@mac.com
Agree that the likelihood that the merchant ship, even at 18.5 kts., would have been overtaking a destroyer would normally be small, but in this case the destroyer MAY have been slow steaming to make arrival at a given time. (Say 0600hrs. L/T?)
With a distance remaining of +/- 60 n.miles and 4.5 hrs. to go, that could mean they were at approx. 14-15 kts., allowing for slower speed at approach and maneuver time.
I raised the question earlier if they could have been using the time for something else, thus not be following the normal shipping lane?
But if they were doing any form of exercising, wouldn’t the CO be on the bridge?
PS> Even if the Fritz was not following the shipping lane, they should have anticipated that the Crystal and other commercial traffic would do so, especially if there were some sort of official or unofficial TSS in the area.
First of all, how do any of us know whether there was radio communication between these two vessels before this casualty? There very well could have been and my point is if units like yards were thrown around there definitely could have been confusion amongst the Filipino bridge team on the Crystal. It’s just not how the majority of the world at sea communicates distance.
You are correct that there is no substitute for experience on the bridge. The Captain or CO cannot be there all the time. If a Naval vessel is essentially a training ship with weapons, shouldn’t every watch have a truly seasoned officer overseeing and correcting mistakes? A previous post mentioned that most OOD’s are newly minted Ensigns or Lt. JG’s and they move on quickly once they are qualified. In the merchant fleet, once a junior officer is proven, they advance their license and build on their experience. By the time they become Master they may have been going to sea for a decade or more and logged thousands of hours on the bridge. Thousands of hours monitoring radio traffic, plotting positions on charts, sending weather reports, checking compass error by azimuth of a celestial body, operating two radars simultaneously, conning, etc. If you’re looking to train a “jack of all trades” officer, why not focus on the multi faceted trade of navigation officer and keep that person in that position?
There have been some questions why the Crystal only reported the incident to Japanese Coast Guard at 0220 hrs. L/T. Suspicious behaviour. Why?? What are they hiding??
Well maybe they were busy checking their own vessel’s condition, taking soundings and tally of their crew etc.??
We don’t know if they reported to their Owners and Charterers, or even to their P&I Club first.
The Fritz apparently didn’t report to their own base before 0230 hrs. L/T and to the JCG only after being call up to confirm the report from Crystal and enquire whether they needed any help. Why???
My underway time on USN ships ended 30 years ago, so I can’t verify current practice, or how technology has affected practice. However, a ‘newly-minted Ensign’, regardless of commissioning source, has to attend Surface Warfare School for six months, then likely several other short courses before reporting to their first ship. Initial bridge watches will be a JOOW (3rd officer on the bridge) on a large ship, or JOOD on a smaller ship, starting at the bottom of the learning curve. Everything from[quote=“DamnYankee, post:158, topic:45129”]
monitoring radio traffic, plotting positions on charts, sending weather reports, checking compass error by azimuth of a celestial body, operating two radars simultaneously, conning, etc.[/quote] Qualification as OOD by the CO is based on subjective evaluation and observation of knowledge, temperment, skills, and trustworthiness. Perhaps one of the key trust items is that the OOD will, indeed, call the Captain whenever in doubt about the situation. How long this process takes depends on the ship’s underway schedule, the individual’s learning curve, and the CO. In my seven years on surface ships as division officer, department head and executive officer, I don’t recall seeing any (a few) officers qualified as OOD before being promoted to LT(jg) - two years after commissioning.
Whereas a merchant ship will have its designated watch-standing Mates, a naval vessel should have far more OODs - with varying experience levels - available for the watch bill. A wise Senior Watch Officer should put more experienced people on watch when the operational and/or navigational situation requires it. This does not include Special Sea and Anchor Detail, when all stations on the ship are manned by the most experienced people, with the CO and XO both on the bridge, Chief Engineer in Main Control, etc.
Do we know which model of MAN engine the Crystal’s licensed copy is of?
I have copied this from WIKIPEDIA.
“ACX Crystal was built in 2008 by STX Offshore & Shipbuilding at their Jinhae shipyard in Changwon, South Korea.[3] The ship’s main engine, made by STX to a MAN B&W design, is an 8-cylinder diesel of 28,880 kW (39,265 bhp) mcr, giving a maximum speed of 25.3 knots (46.9 km/h; 29.1 mph) and a service speed of 23.0 knots (42.6 km/h; 26.5 mph).[3]”
I looked up my old books and it might be an MAN B&W 8 K80 ME-C main engine , bore 800 mm, stroke 2300 mm.
Here is a link to a manual for such an engine pdf.
K80MC-C Mk 6 Project Guide
Two-stroke Engines
Starting system is in section 6.08