They are technically more complex (which should argue against colliding with anything) but when they run aground or collide with merchant vessels they are certainly operating in the same environment.
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At the end of the day, ships don’t hit ships. People driving ships hit other people driving ships.
It’s the people, not the tech. It’s incumbent on whoever has the con to have full situational awareness and concentrate on the hazards.
Too many screens on the bridge and not enough looking ahead.
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They operate in literally the same environments. The anchorage was full of merchant ships.
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Horseshit.
„”””. READY TO GIVE THEM HELL „”!!!
Wow . That is HELL OF a statement.
Must be a lot of Nav Warnings on navtex areas and EGC . All Med Sea in the panic mode.
At the time they were.
I was responding to @Hogsnort, I edited my post to make that more clear.
You think operating a nuclear powered aircraft carrier with 4500 crew in a place like the PG (Persian Gulf) is as simple as operating a old bulker?
It kind of is on one level, you need to not run into other ships as a baseline and work up from there.
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If you know a way to reduce the risk of collisions at sea to zero you should have spoken up before now.
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I get it, easy to be a smart ass sitting in a chair ashore. My issue continues to be just ONE aircraft carrier is a huge chunk of our national defense. These ships should be the hardest things in the world to sneak up on and run into.
When they anchor subs here they look like 2 boats anchored near each other at night, so they have a guy in a RIB that runs circles all night keeping people from going “between the boats”. Maybe some equivalent level of looking out for things?
On your point - yes. It has been a long time since I have known any of this first hand - so not sure how relevant it is.
An aircraft carrier underway in a task group - would be really really hard to hit with anything. Kind of the whole purpose of the task group is protect the carrier.
Now sitting at anchor, or maneuvering in a “friendly” port - at least in my memory - they could be very vulnerable to attack by any number of dedicated attacks.
So what do you do - sure there is a heightened guard on all Navy ships in port to protect against attack - but if you are maneuvering or even underway alone - and you see a risk of collision - the command needs to make a quick and important decision - is this an attack or just bad seamanship? In some cases easy - a 30 ft high speed boat heading right at you. In some cases not. I don’t think we want the US Navy to shoot a missile into a bulk carrier in as an extremis answer to all available means.
Or be able to NOT run into other ships when operating in crowded anchorages, narrow straits, or anywhere with heavy civilian traffic, just like all other vessels in the world. Unfortunately neither Navy- or civilian ships ALWAYS manage.
Are Navy vessels more difficult to operate when they are NOT doing complex navy operation?
Or is the problem that they keep using their complex operating procedure regardless of what is needed at the time?
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The occasional destroyer has managed this feat to its chagrin.
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ha ha - good point
Man there’s a really good video out there of a destroyer or frigate or something doing a hard left behind another ship and then t-boning the third ship on the other side.
I found it!
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Ouch!
This is the one I was thinking of – Melbourne/Evans.
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Interview with CO from 26:51 to 29:38 of the video clip below.
QUOTE
…because of the uh complexity of the machine, the number of people we have embarked I do have an incredible supporting task of department heads, that are all well experienced .
Most of them around the 20 year mark of experience as professionals in our service especially in their fields and obviously we could not make this operation happen without their leadership and expertise …
END QUOTE
20 years experience ? How many years experience one needs to use signal lights , aldis lamps , vhf to alert the other ship ? This question applies to both participants of the event.
But navy ships (valuable navy assets) collisions with merchant ships or other craft are not solely the US speciality.
Sailboat Collides with French Aircraft Carrier Charles de Gaulle - Naval News
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In HMNZS Blackpool the bridge watch changed at 23:45 with the CIC changing at 00:15 to give an overlap. The 8 to 12 OOW was in the CIC at the time of collision and the course and speed of both Evans and Melbourne were plotted right up to the collision.
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No. The RIB is doing security patrols, not safety of navigation patrols. You will find the RIB crew are armed and will warn off vessels approaching within a declared restricted zone.
Anchored submarines show anchor lights but cannot illuminate decks as other ships can.
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Repercussions went beyond the USN. The Captain of HMAS Melbourne, Captain Stevenson, was court martialed and submitted his famous defence of “No case to answer” and was acquitted but nevertheless posted to a junior position in what was seen as an unforgivable snub to the Navy’s most promising captain who would undoubtedly normally be promoted to rear admiral. He honourably resigned.
The inquiry considerably upset Australians involved as it was seen that King was improperly biased against Australia and has sought to blame Melbourne despite eventually finding all fault lay with Frank E Evans officers. Stevenson had dined with the COs of all the escort ships before the exercises and personally instructed them of the requirement to turn away from the carrier after the lessons learnt in Melbourne’s previous collision with destroyer HMAS Voyager a few years earlier. So there was no doubt what the requirement was for escort ship manoeuvring with Melbourne.
These lessons don’t apply to warships manoeuvring in crowded anchorages but I can assure everyone that in my experience the bridge of a warship is an efficient and focussed place despite many more people than people here are used to. In addition, constant interaction with the Operations Room/CIC where there is a completely separate but complimentary collision avoidance plot occurring provides a double check on proposed courses of action.
I cannot explain how these two large ships collided. Both should have been well aware of each other.
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