What the hell has happened to our damage control capabilities? We all know having a fire at sea isn’t optimal, but it isn’t all that rare either. Lots of takeaways I’m sure, but for me the biggest is that if we don’t get our DC squared away, we are gonna get our asses kicked in the next fight, no matter who it is against.
I always liked "Seven Deadly Sailors" for the way is showed the consequences of how complacency in minor matters could lead to disasters. "Forging the links in the causality chain" as it were.
They should but it is likely considered obsolete or somehow not applicable nearly 60 years later.
But it is. And DC training for everyone, from CO to SR should be rigorously and fanatically pursued.
An anecdote*:
We were at Gitmo, way back when Gitmo was the home of FLTTRAGRULANT for either initial workup as a newly commissioned ship or REFTRA, forget which. We were pierside aft of another FFG7. It must have been Sunday as we hadn't been underway that day and weren't planning to get underway that day. I was OOD on the quarterdeck when the other FFG called away the fire party. I looked at the POW as he was looking to me. "I didn't hear this is a drill." "Me either." "Call away R&A." So he did.
The R&A team appeared almost as if by magic. I always marveled at how fast these things happened when it wasn't a drill. Always beat the best drill times. I had sent the messenger up the pier to see what was happening but he wasn't back yet when the POIC of the R&A asked if they should go on up or not. I thought a second or two and came to the conclusion that if they weren't needed it was still good to go through the motions and I'd worry about the bitching over dragging all that gear the 100 yards or so up the pier later. If it turned out that the were needed, well need to get with it. So I sent them off just as the XO was showing up on the quarterdeck to make himself a nuisance.
As it turned out, our R&A did go aboard and dealt with the fire. When they got back I asked what happened. Apparently the fire was in a electronics space near the quarterdeck (a frequency converter room), that was utilized for storing all their picnic supplies they expected to use on one of their down days. Apparently overheated and caught on fire. As you may know, paper burns really hot, so it was going to be bad. I guess someone found the door hot, or maybe smoke was leaking out to alert them. But when their fire party cracked the door it flashed. One of the hosemen panicked and dropped the hose and ran which apparently started a chain reaction. Our guys apparently then went aboard and picked up their hoses to put the fire out.
That, ladies and gents, is the difference between well trained DC teams and poorly trained DC teams.
*I suppose I should have started this with "This is no shit."
The main advantage of Gitmo for REFTRA was there was little else to do to distract you from the job at hand.
That said, it was a pretty nice tropical paradise when you had the odd day to hang about. I never talked to anyone stationed there from those days who didn't think it was great duty station. Most said they would retire there if they could. No idea what the current thoughts are though.
I last went through the flight deck firefighting course about 10 years ago and they were still showing “Trial by Fire” - it’s a timeless training aid that ain’t likely to go away anytime soon. Without knowing any of the details from this mishap I’m hesitant to say anything further - other than that fire/explosions in naval units have ALWAYS been dangers: even the “Greatest Generation” had a few - the West Loch disaster, Port Chicago, USS Mount Hood, USS Serpens, etc…
Navy ships have been catching fire since…forever. It’s a hazard that transcends time & politics - name an era that you think was the “golden age” and I can probably point out a major conflagration that happened at sea aboard a USN vessel.
That it took twelve hours to extinguish the fire is not indicative of that crew's competence at DC. Attacking a fire in storerooms full of flammable who-knows-what was not easy. Just getting hose teams up to the face of the fire might have been difficult.
I'm more concerned about how the fire got started in the first place. Yep, it happens, but it shouldn't.
Believe it or not NAVSEA is looking at this all the time. In my day it was low smoke electrical cable jackets, as PVC jackets were introduced to reduce weight from the old armored cable, but found the smoke was toxic.
We took lessons learned from Stark and the RN Falkland Islands to update our firefighting equipment and doctrine, which was pretty much unchanged from WWII. Of course now you have first HALON being denied due to enviro concerns and now AFFF. Guess it's back to protein foam and "donkey appendages".
USS Stark (FFG 31) was hit by two Exocet missiles in 1987. The crew put out the fires and saved the ship. USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD 6) caught on fire while tied to the pier in 2020. The crew, assisted by local firefighters, could not put out the fires and the ship was a total loss. What we really need to start asking ourselves is what changed between 1987 and 2020 that crews are unable to effectively fight shipboard fires?
A ship in the yard is uniquely at risk. I am not making any kind of defense for the shipyard, but a ship in the yard is different from a ship underway. It is not a fair comparison; apples to oranges.
Having served 24 years onboard 5 different ships and gone through plenty of yard periods and availabilities, I very much understand the difference. However, during all those yard periods, we never had a catastrophic fire because we paid close attention to what was going on in the yards and made frequent ship checks for fire hazards. Can’t say the same about LHD 6.
Shame on you Ron! There will be a safety stand down, we will talk about Getting Real and Getting Better, we will even talk about how losing a ship in a collision, or burning to the water line affects those in the office! Then we will go back to work and march forward with the lessons-learned shelved and professionally ignored.
My Bad. I've become too cynical after decades of watching what we do vs what we say. I'd commit to one hour of wearing a hair shirt, but I'm swamped this week.
Chew on this. When you went through at least one of your yard periods, you would have been exposed to historical information about the risks of certain practices. There are case studies of accidents used to educate workers about the risks of industrial actions. For each of these cases, there was a historical record of, very frequently, catastrophic losses, included the loss of life, in shipyard accidents.
I would re-word that first statement to read a ship inport, at sea or in a shipyard is uniquely at risk when their sailors time is consumed with DEI and gender pronoun training instead of the DC drills.
The number of sources of flammable material and the number of heat sources goes up nearly exponentially while in a yard period. If you then top that off with either badly trained or insufficient numbers of fire watch personnel, things get out of hand rapidly.
It’s even worse because BuPers will disrupt your crew; experienced members of the DC team are replaced with boots; Reliable Petty Officers are off at school; and you don’t have the well-oiled DC team that was in place before the yard-birds started destroying your systems.
Very good point. Thank you. In the mid 80's I was the ship supe for the major overhaul of a cruiser that had had a LOT of wear and tear and previous repairs. It is amazing how many surprising flammables came to light only after applying a cutting torch nearby. We came close to having a small fire every day, and all of those boots standing fire watch were always on my mind.
I think being at sea and in war zone helped the Stark. LHD-6 was port side, opened up for repair, crew not all aboard, and confusion in the chain of command.
Really? The Stark was literally blown apart in the forward section of the ship and set ablaze at midship. Dozens of the crew were killed. How does that help them in damage control efforts as compared to a BHR sitting pierside? Had the BHR crew even remotely been doing their jobs to a minimum standard, they should have saved their ship. The crew of the Stark were all heroes of the highest standards of the U.S. Navy. They did not give up the ship.
BHR had plenty of hoses, lines and vent conduits running through passageways, making the ability to close-off compartments limited, not to mention power and fire mains weren't charged or active. Then there's the issue of not having enough crew onboard, as anybody knows one of the most important factors in DC is having enough bodies to not just replace casualties but, to fight the ship either fire, flooding or, both.
IN short, you're not wrong about the inability of the current Navy to manage catastrophes but, lets not conflate what happened to Stark, Sammy B and others, to a ship that was in the yard. BTW- I'm still aghast and pissed that the CO, XO and others on BHR was not brought up on charges, at the very least for their disgraceful lack of leadership.
“...lets not conflate what happened to StarK, Sammy B and others, to a ship that was in the yard.” The reason for the comparison is because in 1987 a properly trained crew, that likely went through refresher training in Gitmo, was able to save their ship after sustaining catastrophic damage. The point is that between the time of the attack on the Stark and the BHR fire, damage control training has degraded significantly. I’ll say it again, “Bring back REFTRA at Gitmo!!!”
I believe REFTA aspects have been incorporated into JTEX/COMPTUEX however it doesn't come close. Bringing back the FTG and REFTA I'd be in favor of however prior to that, gonna need to secure more funding Navy wide, maintenance funding and clear priorities need to be elevated and INSURV needs to be brought back in an aggressive way.
The Navy has more than sufficient operational funds to reinstate REFTRA. Stop paying a billion dollars a year on NCIS and you can fund 10 REFTRAs or more.
"The actions ordered by U.S. Pacific Fleet commander Adm. Samuel Paparo include letters of reprimand and forfeitures of pay for former commander Bonhomme Richard Capt. Gregory Thoroman and executive officer Capt. Michael Ray, as well as a punitive letter of reprimand for the ship’s Command Master Chief Jose Hernandez, according to a statement from the service provided to USNI News." So says USNI. It comes from Paparo, and he seems like an honest sailor.
While all their careers are done, the fact that the ESG commander was pier side directing the firefighting efforts...leads me to believe the command triad was not only negligent but incompetent thus they escaped what should've been a court-martial. They lost their ship after all.
I agree. The most honorable and diligent Navy did court-martial Seaman Recruit Ryan Mays for the fire. Mays went thru hell for two years, thanks to the Navy. Not the first time, and will not be the last, where the Navy looks to blame the lowest enlisted sailor they can find.
While stateside, a ship's duty section is about 25% of the regular daytime crew. In times past, the duty section was deemed fit to perform firefighting and DC until more help arrived. BHR failed. I think that is fair to say. Foresight is better than hindsight.
Being in the shipyard they likely had significantly reduced manning. It is typical that crew that PCS out are not replaced until near completion of the yard period. Further that is a time that it is convenient to send people off to schools and leave.
And to make it worse, at some point the ship becomes uninhabitable, or mostly so and you have difficulty just housing the duty section.
Not an excuse for them by any means, but they are typically stretched thin. Add that to typically low morale over the crappy conditions and all the yard birds with an attitude crawling over your ship and it's not optimal for anything.
All true, LT NEMO, been there myself. How many ships when stretched thin like that ever ask for help, go to 3 section duty or alert their higher ups. Not many, I'd bet, if the "faithful" reporting of your status via the old SORTS messages was any clue.
3 section duty? That was standard on the FFGs, in port or underway. Wore you out quick underway.
SORTS? Don't recognize that one, it was CASREP in my day, which was purely reporting down systems or systems that were down but now up. Don't recall any overall status reports.
But yeah, no one wanted to put themselves on report. I get it. But I don't. It's a dangerous game to play. The whole CASREP system grew out of the FF that had its 5" gun inop during the Mayaguez operation.
That still is no excuse. Every time the ships I was on were in the yard, firefighting was front and center. Every duty section had a drill. The main blame for what happened on the BHR was on the CO (and, arguably his predecessor).
The risk has been understood for better than a century. But, people forget, and they sure did in San Diego. It's been an era during which the US Navy has not considered The Sea, and its ships, are the central reasons it exists.
Since I'm sure many have never heard of this, giving it a rebump.
If you read the investigation, problems existed from the deck plates (maintenance of installed firefighting) up through CNSP, NAVSEA 04, and CNIC. So institutional. I suppose we can offer opinions as to what was given higher priority. As a retired guy I can only speculate.
In one of my jobs I was in a PMS working with what was SEA-05L at the time who had responsibility for all H,M,&E trainers. At that time one of their big jobs was replacing all the fleet firefighting trainers due to air pollution. I didn't have any experience with the new trainers and often wondered how effective they are.
Back then we had CNTECHTRA to manage H,M,&E training but at some point it seems to have been consolidated away into NETC.
Sure there were massive institutional failures. The lack of coordination, no fireboats.
However, the CO...and the one before him....apparently ignored the dismal shape the ship's firefighting systems aboard. Not to mention, the in general horrible shape the ship was in. And the Big Kahuna, the lack of focus and training of the crew.
The ship was their responsibility. Period. If they weren't aware of the serious risk of fire while in the yard, all you can say is they were pitifully incompetent.
Their ship. Their responsibility to go about fixing the problem, and mitigating the risk to the Command.
Can't disagree. As a CHENG during an ROH was acutely aware. But this was in a public yard and my DCA and the yard ship supe worked closely together coordinating. But as the ROH proceeded our attention was highly focused on LOE which had a centerpiece of Class Bravo fire in a main machinery space that the duty section had to respond to. Not sure if they do that any more.
I'm asking why we still have not installed a foam-based firefighting system.
Pumping water is very, very slow and antiquated. You want a C02/N2 compressed foam-based system ready to gush out and fill the fire-burning space quickly.
I'm sure the PLA is watching us with a smile and interest.
All they need to do to hit those ships with a missile loaded with propellants and boom, we go.
Alternatively, PLA can just recruit a willing spy/sympathizer and toss a match and some oil cloths.
Torching supplies and granaries had been the classic strategies in ancient wars. The Chinese know this very, very well from their past wars.
Hope the USN learn from this fire mishaps and comes out with better procedures and guardrails/.
We only had CO2 inerting in amphib MOGAS pump rooms or specialized system for LM2500 engine modules. But when MOGAS was finally removed we de-activated the CO2 systems. HALON was outlawed due to ozone hole and then AFFF found to be "forever chemical" so it's always something.
Not saying you’re wrong, but Bonhomme Richard was in ROS with very reduced crew and even fewer on the weekend when their fires started. And in that it started in LVS (Lower Vehicle Stowage) it had a chance to “climb” a long way and get a good hold before it was even detected. Can’t speak to the smoke/heat detection sensors — perhaps disabled for IMS?
They want LSM construction interval set at 3 years and are going to hire a 3rd party ship construction manager like how the maritime administration hired TOTE for the training ship builds.
The waylaying of maintenance and yard periods of the amphibious fleet during the early-00's continues to be problematic. The remaining LSD's are near useless and what LPD's exist are more complex than necessary.
Avondale shipyard got "fired" due to quality problems with these ships. I don't know why it couldn't be fixed. It would be nice to have that capacity now, rather than depending on 'goula for everything.
At this point, we need a SERIOUS long discussion. on building more Amphibs and especially more LPD's LST and LHA/LHD's. At the same time we need to overhaul our DC rate. I think the Damen LST 100 or 120 should be considered along with the Mistral class LHD
At this point we need hulls and we need them like yesterday. We should have kept building more America-class amphibious assault ship and seriously bring the Flight 2 San Antonio class LPD. The LST, we sorely need them back and maybe the Damen LST 100 and 120 is what the US Navy sorely needs.
A modern LST is missing from the force. The current LPD is overly complex and the remaining LSD's were abused and put away wet. In short Navy wanted the amphibious force to be a small compact bunch of ships, the reality is the AO is heavily saturated with A2/AD and the force is too concentrated to be effective.
That's why the US Navy needs a Modern LST along with a Modern frigate/Corvette to help protect the Modern LST. That's why the Damen LST 100 and 120 is what the US Navy desperately needs.
My understanding is that LCACs can access over 4x the beaches that LSTs can. I think the Newport class was very cool, but are they really still needed?
Looks like a fubar. Early hours yet, but this sure seems like deja vu.
As others have mentioned, the priority is to hope that any sailors on board the vessel are safe. Damage control concerns will be an issue.
Will SECNAV and SecDef be more proactive on this event than those who were in charge when the USS Bonhomme Richard was burnt to the waterline while at a U.S. Navy pier? I hope so, but my faith level is low. Will the Navy once again find the lowest level enlisted sailor to blame this on, as the Navy has a record of doing? C'mon, Navy, do better.
The last firefighting training that I took was 20 years ago, but it was total garbage from my point of view. I love the bunker gear and Scott Air Pack, those were nice. But... there was no smoke, cannot violate CA pollution laws you know. That made it totally unrealistic. Instead of actually burning wood and oil, they had pretty natural gas flames, twinkling blue.
No smoke, no oil reflashing under your feet, totally unrealistic. Oh, and the class was cut from 2 full days to less than one day, with lots of classroom.
As far as fire boats, there are currently two ATS in service and one that is in initial workup after commissioning. Two more are under construction, with a total of ten planned.
I did repair party leader at Treasure Island in 91 or so. That was a good school and some of it seemed fairly realistic, minus the "I might die here" pucker factor that attends in a real situation.
Start with the crew from that War College video last week whining about Greenland and diversity and the awwwwwfullllllll political climate they plan to protest. Maintaining manpower capability and, gosh, maybe maintaining the ships themselves, should be a much higher priority it would seem. Navy leadership needs to focus on what matters.
^ My knee jerk response after about 45 second (and not a second longer) of listening to this guy's lip-smacking (which in fairness, may have triggered my misophonia, and may have skewed my reaction) was to think him either invidious or insidious. Don't know which. Maybe both. I had a commie professor when I was going to college at night in the 70's. He got his PhD under Herbert Marcuse. I took 5 or 6 courses from him in poli-sci & ethics because he was an Easy "A" as long as I spelled Amerika as Amerika. Yeah, I catered to his prejudices, but I needed easy courses...only had 39 months on neutral duty to finish 3 degrees. Cobbling courses together to fit into a degree was tough. Anyway, there was a Marine Major in one of the classes who leaned on him real hard about his un-American Bolshevism in an MCAS Kaneohe classroom. It made subsequent classes less stomach turning.
Hopefully DCA and the repair lockers are squared away this time.
Prayers for the crew and all those helping to battle the fire.
What the hell has happened to our damage control capabilities? We all know having a fire at sea isn’t optimal, but it isn’t all that rare either. Lots of takeaways I’m sure, but for me the biggest is that if we don’t get our DC squared away, we are gonna get our asses kicked in the next fight, no matter who it is against.
Wonder if Recruits are still required to watch “Trial by Fire” in bootcamp?https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIE2QfDzmGc
I always liked "Seven Deadly Sailors" for the way is showed the consequences of how complacency in minor matters could lead to disasters. "Forging the links in the causality chain" as it were.
The Forestfire still makes me nervous.
Don't forget the Enterprise just a couple years later...
She continued on to her 1969 combat deployment with the #4 elevator welded at the fight deck level.
Note, in the second pic below, the hole in her transom where a bomb had fallen through the hole at the aft end of the flight deck and detonated there.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Enterprise_fire#/media/File:USS_Enterprise_(CVN-65)_burning,_stern_view.jpg
https://www.reddit.com/r/WarshipPorn/comments/kxlfjf/otd_january_14_1969_a_fire_breaks_out_on_the/#lightbox
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Enterprise_fire
Good grief.
And, not as visible, but quite serious, was the Oriskany fire in 1966...
https://www.usni.org/magazines/naval-history-magazine/2021/october/angels-oriskany-fire
^
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=af3veRBDJm0&ab_channel=ArmouredArchivist
They should but it is likely considered obsolete or somehow not applicable nearly 60 years later.
But it is. And DC training for everyone, from CO to SR should be rigorously and fanatically pursued.
An anecdote*:
We were at Gitmo, way back when Gitmo was the home of FLTTRAGRULANT for either initial workup as a newly commissioned ship or REFTRA, forget which. We were pierside aft of another FFG7. It must have been Sunday as we hadn't been underway that day and weren't planning to get underway that day. I was OOD on the quarterdeck when the other FFG called away the fire party. I looked at the POW as he was looking to me. "I didn't hear this is a drill." "Me either." "Call away R&A." So he did.
The R&A team appeared almost as if by magic. I always marveled at how fast these things happened when it wasn't a drill. Always beat the best drill times. I had sent the messenger up the pier to see what was happening but he wasn't back yet when the POIC of the R&A asked if they should go on up or not. I thought a second or two and came to the conclusion that if they weren't needed it was still good to go through the motions and I'd worry about the bitching over dragging all that gear the 100 yards or so up the pier later. If it turned out that the were needed, well need to get with it. So I sent them off just as the XO was showing up on the quarterdeck to make himself a nuisance.
As it turned out, our R&A did go aboard and dealt with the fire. When they got back I asked what happened. Apparently the fire was in a electronics space near the quarterdeck (a frequency converter room), that was utilized for storing all their picnic supplies they expected to use on one of their down days. Apparently overheated and caught on fire. As you may know, paper burns really hot, so it was going to be bad. I guess someone found the door hot, or maybe smoke was leaking out to alert them. But when their fire party cracked the door it flashed. One of the hosemen panicked and dropped the hose and ran which apparently started a chain reaction. Our guys apparently then went aboard and picked up their hoses to put the fire out.
That, ladies and gents, is the difference between well trained DC teams and poorly trained DC teams.
*I suppose I should have started this with "This is no shit."
I’ve said it many times before here at CDR Salamander, “Bring back REFTRA at Gitmo!!!”
The main advantage of Gitmo for REFTRA was there was little else to do to distract you from the job at hand.
That said, it was a pretty nice tropical paradise when you had the odd day to hang about. I never talked to anyone stationed there from those days who didn't think it was great duty station. Most said they would retire there if they could. No idea what the current thoughts are though.
I last went through the flight deck firefighting course about 10 years ago and they were still showing “Trial by Fire” - it’s a timeless training aid that ain’t likely to go away anytime soon. Without knowing any of the details from this mishap I’m hesitant to say anything further - other than that fire/explosions in naval units have ALWAYS been dangers: even the “Greatest Generation” had a few - the West Loch disaster, Port Chicago, USS Mount Hood, USS Serpens, etc…
What ever happened to the 13 General Orders?
My wife doesn't understand some things I do are just following that little seed in my head.
DEI
Navy ships have been catching fire since…forever. It’s a hazard that transcends time & politics - name an era that you think was the “golden age” and I can probably point out a major conflagration that happened at sea aboard a USN vessel.
That's true! Collison's, a whole Navy squadron hit a reef at the same time once. It happens.
Too early and not enough information to tell.
[edit: idiot moment deleted]
It is. Probably a fan over heated.
That it took twelve hours to extinguish the fire is not indicative of that crew's competence at DC. Attacking a fire in storerooms full of flammable who-knows-what was not easy. Just getting hose teams up to the face of the fire might have been difficult.
I'm more concerned about how the fire got started in the first place. Yep, it happens, but it shouldn't.
Maybe it’s time to talk to NASA about non-flammable items. You can’t eliminate everything…but keeping the fuel to a minimum is prudent.
Believe it or not NAVSEA is looking at this all the time. In my day it was low smoke electrical cable jackets, as PVC jackets were introduced to reduce weight from the old armored cable, but found the smoke was toxic.
We took lessons learned from Stark and the RN Falkland Islands to update our firefighting equipment and doctrine, which was pretty much unchanged from WWII. Of course now you have first HALON being denied due to enviro concerns and now AFFF. Guess it's back to protein foam and "donkey appendages".
USS Stark (FFG 31) was hit by two Exocet missiles in 1987. The crew put out the fires and saved the ship. USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD 6) caught on fire while tied to the pier in 2020. The crew, assisted by local firefighters, could not put out the fires and the ship was a total loss. What we really need to start asking ourselves is what changed between 1987 and 2020 that crews are unable to effectively fight shipboard fires?
Gundog,
A ship in the yard is uniquely at risk. I am not making any kind of defense for the shipyard, but a ship in the yard is different from a ship underway. It is not a fair comparison; apples to oranges.
Having served 24 years onboard 5 different ships and gone through plenty of yard periods and availabilities, I very much understand the difference. However, during all those yard periods, we never had a catastrophic fire because we paid close attention to what was going on in the yards and made frequent ship checks for fire hazards. Can’t say the same about LHD 6.
Thanks for that perspective, Gundog. I have little faith in our Navy's ability to implement Lessons Learned.
Roger that!
Shame on you Ron! There will be a safety stand down, we will talk about Getting Real and Getting Better, we will even talk about how losing a ship in a collision, or burning to the water line affects those in the office! Then we will go back to work and march forward with the lessons-learned shelved and professionally ignored.
My Bad. I've become too cynical after decades of watching what we do vs what we say. I'd commit to one hour of wearing a hair shirt, but I'm swamped this week.
Mea Culpa :)
Chew on this. When you went through at least one of your yard periods, you would have been exposed to historical information about the risks of certain practices. There are case studies of accidents used to educate workers about the risks of industrial actions. For each of these cases, there was a historical record of, very frequently, catastrophic losses, included the loss of life, in shipyard accidents.
I would re-word that first statement to read a ship inport, at sea or in a shipyard is uniquely at risk when their sailors time is consumed with DEI and gender pronoun training instead of the DC drills.
The number of sources of flammable material and the number of heat sources goes up nearly exponentially while in a yard period. If you then top that off with either badly trained or insufficient numbers of fire watch personnel, things get out of hand rapidly.
It’s even worse because BuPers will disrupt your crew; experienced members of the DC team are replaced with boots; Reliable Petty Officers are off at school; and you don’t have the well-oiled DC team that was in place before the yard-birds started destroying your systems.
Very good point. Thank you. In the mid 80's I was the ship supe for the major overhaul of a cruiser that had had a LOT of wear and tear and previous repairs. It is amazing how many surprising flammables came to light only after applying a cutting torch nearby. We came close to having a small fire every day, and all of those boots standing fire watch were always on my mind.
I think being at sea and in war zone helped the Stark. LHD-6 was port side, opened up for repair, crew not all aboard, and confusion in the chain of command.
Really? The Stark was literally blown apart in the forward section of the ship and set ablaze at midship. Dozens of the crew were killed. How does that help them in damage control efforts as compared to a BHR sitting pierside? Had the BHR crew even remotely been doing their jobs to a minimum standard, they should have saved their ship. The crew of the Stark were all heroes of the highest standards of the U.S. Navy. They did not give up the ship.
BHR had plenty of hoses, lines and vent conduits running through passageways, making the ability to close-off compartments limited, not to mention power and fire mains weren't charged or active. Then there's the issue of not having enough crew onboard, as anybody knows one of the most important factors in DC is having enough bodies to not just replace casualties but, to fight the ship either fire, flooding or, both.
IN short, you're not wrong about the inability of the current Navy to manage catastrophes but, lets not conflate what happened to Stark, Sammy B and others, to a ship that was in the yard. BTW- I'm still aghast and pissed that the CO, XO and others on BHR was not brought up on charges, at the very least for their disgraceful lack of leadership.
“...lets not conflate what happened to StarK, Sammy B and others, to a ship that was in the yard.” The reason for the comparison is because in 1987 a properly trained crew, that likely went through refresher training in Gitmo, was able to save their ship after sustaining catastrophic damage. The point is that between the time of the attack on the Stark and the BHR fire, damage control training has degraded significantly. I’ll say it again, “Bring back REFTRA at Gitmo!!!”
I believe REFTA aspects have been incorporated into JTEX/COMPTUEX however it doesn't come close. Bringing back the FTG and REFTA I'd be in favor of however prior to that, gonna need to secure more funding Navy wide, maintenance funding and clear priorities need to be elevated and INSURV needs to be brought back in an aggressive way.
The Navy has more than sufficient operational funds to reinstate REFTRA. Stop paying a billion dollars a year on NCIS and you can fund 10 REFTRAs or more.
"The actions ordered by U.S. Pacific Fleet commander Adm. Samuel Paparo include letters of reprimand and forfeitures of pay for former commander Bonhomme Richard Capt. Gregory Thoroman and executive officer Capt. Michael Ray, as well as a punitive letter of reprimand for the ship’s Command Master Chief Jose Hernandez, according to a statement from the service provided to USNI News." So says USNI. It comes from Paparo, and he seems like an honest sailor.
https://news.usni.org/2022/07/15/navy-announces-punishments-for-bonhomme-richard-fire-secnav-censures-former-swo-boss
While all their careers are done, the fact that the ESG commander was pier side directing the firefighting efforts...leads me to believe the command triad was not only negligent but incompetent thus they escaped what should've been a court-martial. They lost their ship after all.
I agree. The most honorable and diligent Navy did court-martial Seaman Recruit Ryan Mays for the fire. Mays went thru hell for two years, thanks to the Navy. Not the first time, and will not be the last, where the Navy looks to blame the lowest enlisted sailor they can find.
While stateside, a ship's duty section is about 25% of the regular daytime crew. In times past, the duty section was deemed fit to perform firefighting and DC until more help arrived. BHR failed. I think that is fair to say. Foresight is better than hindsight.
Being in the shipyard they likely had significantly reduced manning. It is typical that crew that PCS out are not replaced until near completion of the yard period. Further that is a time that it is convenient to send people off to schools and leave.
And to make it worse, at some point the ship becomes uninhabitable, or mostly so and you have difficulty just housing the duty section.
Not an excuse for them by any means, but they are typically stretched thin. Add that to typically low morale over the crappy conditions and all the yard birds with an attitude crawling over your ship and it's not optimal for anything.
When the Midways were first converted to angled decks, they were decommissioned.
Same for the Belknap, Leahy, and Farragut DLG's for their AAW upgrades.
All true, LT NEMO, been there myself. How many ships when stretched thin like that ever ask for help, go to 3 section duty or alert their higher ups. Not many, I'd bet, if the "faithful" reporting of your status via the old SORTS messages was any clue.
3 section duty? That was standard on the FFGs, in port or underway. Wore you out quick underway.
SORTS? Don't recognize that one, it was CASREP in my day, which was purely reporting down systems or systems that were down but now up. Don't recall any overall status reports.
But yeah, no one wanted to put themselves on report. I get it. But I don't. It's a dangerous game to play. The whole CASREP system grew out of the FF that had its 5" gun inop during the Mayaguez operation.
Survival is motivating. Necessity is the mother of invention. Yes, the Stark's crew had a radically worse day than LHD-6.
That still is no excuse. Every time the ships I was on were in the yard, firefighting was front and center. Every duty section had a drill. The main blame for what happened on the BHR was on the CO (and, arguably his predecessor).
The risk has been understood for better than a century. But, people forget, and they sure did in San Diego. It's been an era during which the US Navy has not considered The Sea, and its ships, are the central reasons it exists.
Since I'm sure many have never heard of this, giving it a rebump.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_or4VNi-BA
If you read the investigation, problems existed from the deck plates (maintenance of installed firefighting) up through CNSP, NAVSEA 04, and CNIC. So institutional. I suppose we can offer opinions as to what was given higher priority. As a retired guy I can only speculate.
In one of my jobs I was in a PMS working with what was SEA-05L at the time who had responsibility for all H,M,&E trainers. At that time one of their big jobs was replacing all the fleet firefighting trainers due to air pollution. I didn't have any experience with the new trainers and often wondered how effective they are.
Back then we had CNTECHTRA to manage H,M,&E training but at some point it seems to have been consolidated away into NETC.
I've read it.
Sure there were massive institutional failures. The lack of coordination, no fireboats.
However, the CO...and the one before him....apparently ignored the dismal shape the ship's firefighting systems aboard. Not to mention, the in general horrible shape the ship was in. And the Big Kahuna, the lack of focus and training of the crew.
The ship was their responsibility. Period. If they weren't aware of the serious risk of fire while in the yard, all you can say is they were pitifully incompetent.
Their ship. Their responsibility to go about fixing the problem, and mitigating the risk to the Command.
Can't disagree. As a CHENG during an ROH was acutely aware. But this was in a public yard and my DCA and the yard ship supe worked closely together coordinating. But as the ROH proceeded our attention was highly focused on LOE which had a centerpiece of Class Bravo fire in a main machinery space that the duty section had to respond to. Not sure if they do that any more.
Wasn't the BHR steam?
Besides that, all that trash everywhere, and the inop risers.
While it's a 'commercial' yard, how much non Navy work does it do? Firefighting doctrine and responsibilities should've been worked out long before.
I'm asking why we still have not installed a foam-based firefighting system.
Pumping water is very, very slow and antiquated. You want a C02/N2 compressed foam-based system ready to gush out and fill the fire-burning space quickly.
I'm sure the PLA is watching us with a smile and interest.
All they need to do to hit those ships with a missile loaded with propellants and boom, we go.
Alternatively, PLA can just recruit a willing spy/sympathizer and toss a match and some oil cloths.
Torching supplies and granaries had been the classic strategies in ancient wars. The Chinese know this very, very well from their past wars.
Hope the USN learn from this fire mishaps and comes out with better procedures and guardrails/.
We only had CO2 inerting in amphib MOGAS pump rooms or specialized system for LM2500 engine modules. But when MOGAS was finally removed we de-activated the CO2 systems. HALON was outlawed due to ozone hole and then AFFF found to be "forever chemical" so it's always something.
So sad.
It is now quite certain another amphibious ship will be written off or in repairs for the next 1-2 years if they are lucky to get scheduled.
Here is the firefighting set up on the EPFs.
- High expansion Foam Mission Bay and Main Machinery Rooms
-AFF on flight deck, mission bay
-Seawater sprinkling in habitability spaces
- FM200 in SSDG / Aux Machinery Spaces
Not saying you’re wrong, but Bonhomme Richard was in ROS with very reduced crew and even fewer on the weekend when their fires started. And in that it started in LVS (Lower Vehicle Stowage) it had a chance to “climb” a long way and get a good hold before it was even detected. Can’t speak to the smoke/heat detection sensors — perhaps disabled for IMS?
We really need to crank up amphibious ship production, don't we.
They want LSM construction interval set at 3 years and are going to hire a 3rd party ship construction manager like how the maritime administration hired TOTE for the training ship builds.
What does NAVSEA do?
Not sure, probably still doing some design work.
That means we should be able to let go about 75,000 of the 80k otherwise idle folks there...
Bigger bang that the Dogeing of USAID.
The waylaying of maintenance and yard periods of the amphibious fleet during the early-00's continues to be problematic. The remaining LSD's are near useless and what LPD's exist are more complex than necessary.
Avondale shipyard got "fired" due to quality problems with these ships. I don't know why it couldn't be fixed. It would be nice to have that capacity now, rather than depending on 'goula for everything.
That property will never be a shipyard again, unfortunately.
At this point, we need a SERIOUS long discussion. on building more Amphibs and especially more LPD's LST and LHA/LHD's. At the same time we need to overhaul our DC rate. I think the Damen LST 100 or 120 should be considered along with the Mistral class LHD
The plan is start with some new build LSVs (Besson/Kuroda, Israeli LSVs) then switch to Damen LST 100s matching what Australia's plan is.
At this point we need hulls and we need them like yesterday. We should have kept building more America-class amphibious assault ship and seriously bring the Flight 2 San Antonio class LPD. The LST, we sorely need them back and maybe the Damen LST 100 and 120 is what the US Navy sorely needs.
A modern LST is missing from the force. The current LPD is overly complex and the remaining LSD's were abused and put away wet. In short Navy wanted the amphibious force to be a small compact bunch of ships, the reality is the AO is heavily saturated with A2/AD and the force is too concentrated to be effective.
That's why the US Navy needs a Modern LST along with a Modern frigate/Corvette to help protect the Modern LST. That's why the Damen LST 100 and 120 is what the US Navy desperately needs.
Agree. A DC repair Board is in order.
Ok, please help a landlubber here.
My understanding is that LCACs can access over 4x the beaches that LSTs can. I think the Newport class was very cool, but are they really still needed?
Guess this would be a bad time to note that we are lacking enough amphibs and our readiness rates are woeful.
https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2025/08/18/navy-amphib-readiness-dips-as-sailors-marines-deploy-for-caribbean/
Its not too soon...
What a coincidence
The question now is "What can we do right". We are developing a pretty sturdy reputation of "Can't get right."
Looks like a fubar. Early hours yet, but this sure seems like deja vu.
As others have mentioned, the priority is to hope that any sailors on board the vessel are safe. Damage control concerns will be an issue.
Will SECNAV and SecDef be more proactive on this event than those who were in charge when the USS Bonhomme Richard was burnt to the waterline while at a U.S. Navy pier? I hope so, but my faith level is low. Will the Navy once again find the lowest level enlisted sailor to blame this on, as the Navy has a record of doing? C'mon, Navy, do better.
Not all Heroes wear capes. Kudos to all the sailors and those who helped them put out the fire. I cannot imagine fighting a ship's fire for 12 Hours.
https://taskandpurpose.com/news/navy-new-orleans-fire/
At least this isn’t in a U.S. port, given our paucity of firefighting boats.
When DC becomes SOS something went VERY wrong.
Yet one more "data point" leading to questions about training and equipment, especially the former.
Another data point should be how long will it take to undo all the damage done by DEI and get DC training back up to high standards?
Regardless of how long it will take - SOMEBODY damn well better have started the process by now.
Is the Navy neglecting firefighting training? Do we have enough fire boats near every base?
Don't know.
No. How many fireboats does the Navy have? How many dedicated fireboats (Navy or City) are in San Diego? Bremerton? Pearl Harbor?
What worries me is that the Navy doesn’t know either. It’s not just a matter of dedicated but fully functional fireboats.
The last firefighting training that I took was 20 years ago, but it was total garbage from my point of view. I love the bunker gear and Scott Air Pack, those were nice. But... there was no smoke, cannot violate CA pollution laws you know. That made it totally unrealistic. Instead of actually burning wood and oil, they had pretty natural gas flames, twinkling blue.
No smoke, no oil reflashing under your feet, totally unrealistic. Oh, and the class was cut from 2 full days to less than one day, with lots of classroom.
As far as fire boats, there are currently two ATS in service and one that is in initial workup after commissioning. Two more are under construction, with a total of ten planned.
I hope Governor Newsome relaxes those rules. Otherwise the forests of California might burn.
I did repair party leader at Treasure Island in 91 or so. That was a good school and some of it seemed fairly realistic, minus the "I might die here" pucker factor that attends in a real situation.
Did that same school in '92.
What in the unholy hells is going on here?!?!?!?!
What hasn't been going on, Brian, is lining up the sluggards for a Three Stooges group face slap.
Start with the crew from that War College video last week whining about Greenland and diversity and the awwwwwfullllllll political climate they plan to protest. Maintaining manpower capability and, gosh, maybe maintaining the ships themselves, should be a much higher priority it would seem. Navy leadership needs to focus on what matters.
DB...
Did you see this vid that I've posted by Temple Cone, the USNA English Department Chair?
https://www.usna.edu/EnglishDept/Faculty/index.php
In it, he is selling 'Marxist thought' as a valid way to look at the world (or actually evaluate literature specifically).
HE242 Lecture on Marxist Critical Thought
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TYWC-bhzNI
And this on Feminism
HE242 Lecture on Feminism & Feminist Criticism
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3U2KoIl1kmM&t=304s
Good stuff for MIddies to absorb to prepare them for a life at Sea, and perhaps prevail in a War At Sea... Right?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TYWC-bhzNI
"Good stuff for Middies...Right?"
^ My knee jerk response after about 45 second (and not a second longer) of listening to this guy's lip-smacking (which in fairness, may have triggered my misophonia, and may have skewed my reaction) was to think him either invidious or insidious. Don't know which. Maybe both. I had a commie professor when I was going to college at night in the 70's. He got his PhD under Herbert Marcuse. I took 5 or 6 courses from him in poli-sci & ethics because he was an Easy "A" as long as I spelled Amerika as Amerika. Yeah, I catered to his prejudices, but I needed easy courses...only had 39 months on neutral duty to finish 3 degrees. Cobbling courses together to fit into a degree was tough. Anyway, there was a Marine Major in one of the classes who leaned on him real hard about his un-American Bolshevism in an MCAS Kaneohe classroom. It made subsequent classes less stomach turning.
Why is this guy still employed at the Naval Academy???
As the Chair of a department no less.
Speaking of Greenland, every time Sal post's a polar projection I'm reminded why we shouldn't leave it to the Danes and Canadians.