When John went on NPR talking about MSC’s gangway up order a few months ago I thought Rear Adm. Wettloofah would ease up on restrictions. No luck.
Well someone finally cracked under the pressure. The rumor is a 3rd Officer on the USNS Amelia Earhart committed suicide with his patrol weapon and the bridge is covered in blood and guts.
Holy shit
The Amelia Earhart has been at sea since June 12th.
So sad! With Covid-19 and companies holding mariners hostage aboard vessels, no one has taken on to account the mental health and well being of mariners. Not to mention, working at sea isn’t a job where your supervisor is likely to coddle you and ask how you are feeling. Condolences to the mates family.
How hard is it to take care of our sailors; the people we’re short on and the people we need to move goods around the world in peace and war, project force, and maintain navigable waters?
Get people home on time. If you can’t get them home on time, keep them informed as much as possible so they have an idea of when they’ll get home and provide them adequate compensation for stealing their time.
Implement a sensible beard policy. Navies and commercial shipping all over the world allow beards. The threat of fighting a fire aboard a ship is not exclusive to the US Navy. Narrow the requirement to the billets assigned to hose teams. If every single person is required to be ready to fight a fire at all times then the drunks and physically unfit need to go with the beards.
Get rid of the incompetent and egotistical upper management. There are department heads who have absolutely no business being department heads. Implement subordinate evals to go along with supervisor evaluations.
Provide better training, maybe even take a ship going into decom and turn it into a training ship. There are too many people out there filling a billet without even the basic knowledge required for that billet.
MSC could be a great employer, but it squanders its potential with many different issues. A stressed workforce will never be a safe and efficient workforce, just look at the rise in incidents and deaths these past few years.
I heard Starlight is holding their crews on board now for up to 6 weeks, when their usual rotations were up to 3 weeks.
I am sure the same is to be said for other companies in the Bay.
Not a psychiatrist here, but something else going on here other than a delayed crew change that a better solution was to take ones own life. I feel bad for his loved ones.
I call bullshit on that one.
You know how gossip and rumors go. I haven’t confirmed it independently.
Confirmed by Navy Times
I have confirmed it with someone aboard. 
I have also confirmed that at least some of the officers have been aboard for almost six months and there tensions aboard were high before the incident and the situation now sounds worse than anyone can put into words.
We had enough to publish the story this morning but decided to hold off, for which is unusual for us… that’s how bad it is.
Still unconfirmed is the rumor that the navy has put a gag order on the crew and is treating it like a criminal investigation instead of providing the support everyone needs right now.
I just did…i used to work there and still keep in contact with a few guys there.
As far as the atb/tug world goes i heard dann marine delayed crew changes for a while and crowley’s atbs did as well. Some companies have just opted for longer rotations across the board
i.e. 4/4 instead of 2/2.
I wasn’t talking about greater Harley Marine (now Centerline), but specifically Starlight, the ship assist division held in San Francisco Bay. I heard it second hand from a very close to me former co-worker. When I worked for Harley Marine Gulf, 4/4 was the norm. but for Starlight, 2/2 was the norm except on their bunker barge, which was 3/3.
Is it common for the watchstanders to carry a sidearm while at sea? I worked on a white hull MSC ship a while ago, and we only carried sidearms when in port. Everything was locked up underway. What’s the point?
Not at sea. Mate on Watch carries the 9mm inport when the ship is laden with ammo or operating in the Middle East.
Exactly. Article from the Navy Times says the ship was underway…so where’d the weapon come from?
New3M ,Still, no reason to leave this world. To blame extended crew changes or MSC policies , their questionable addressing of the pandemics, however a piss poor reason for this tragedy. Not following the herd on this one. Blame whoever or whatever you want. Regarding weapons, most of MSC crew is trained in weapons. The AB’s are armed with shotguns at the gangway down. The officers carry 9mm pistols as well during that time. The ports they go to sometimes are not friendly… They are trained in use for M16’s as well. Once gangway is up, for the most part weapons are returned to a quite large gun safe until the next port by either the Captain or Chief Mate. How this unfortunate fellow got access to a weapon to harm himself I have no idea.
Oh please. We all know sailors who don’t belong out at sea for one reason or another, mental or otherwise.
Combine that with MSCs handling of their crew changes on a pre-pandemic level, add in their complete boondoggle-ing of the post-pandemic situation, and, while tragic and heartbreaking, it’s a plausible situation.
I’m simply asking how this sailor would have access. I know everybody is qualified. I was qualified as well, and I carried a sidearm in port. White hulls are different than gray hullls, so I didn’t know if the policies were different. Sounds like they are not, so I still wonder how access was gained.
I can’t answer your question. MSC didn’t make this sailor do what he did. How he got a weapon, is beyond me. Will never be plausible to me.