Scratch one flattop
- Thread starter woodreau
- Start date
Lawman
Well-Known Member
What?
Have you seen how many Ship commands have ended in relieving the Capt and probably the COB for good measure because of the ridiculous actions of some E3?
The Navy has absolutely no problem crushing flag level officers, because they have more than there are ships/commands to fill so plenty more where that came from.
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It doesn’t take much to track an officers career into something “not command” at least in the Navy.
It ends up breeding a dog-eat-dog backstab your peers in the wardroom for the guys that know they want to make it a career.
Once you’ve made up your mind that you don’t want to take part in the rat race it makes life much easier.
It ends up breeding a dog-eat-dog backstab your peers in the wardroom for the guys that know they want to make it a career.
Once you’ve made up your mind that you don’t want to take part in the rat race it makes life much easier.
Low_Level_Hell
Well-Known Member
What rank does a Naval Officer have to attain to make it to retirement?
Beefy McGee
Well-Known Member
It's based on a minimum of 20 years of service, not rank, same as the other services. For officers or enlisted. Though depending on your career advancement there may be points where if you get passed over for promotion (twice usually for officers, no set number of times for enlisted) you may not be allowed to continue to reach retirement because you may effectively reach a mandatory years of service for your rank. That would pretty much mean you were early in your career when you got passed over twice though, otherwise a person would have likely been close enough to retirement to make it. I've heard of people getting as far as O-4 and being passed over for O-5 and not making it to 20 years, but anyone getting passed over twice usually has had some situation that's a career stopper.
Low_Level_Hell
Well-Known Member
Thanks. I was wondering if the Navy had the same promotion timeline as the Army. With out any qualifiers such as SELCON or prior enlisted time, an officer can be separated from the Army at 16-17 years as an O-4. I know some quality officers that found themselves in that position.
I just retired last year at 20 years. Not relevant to the conversation but I still enjoy telling people.
Beefy McGee
Well-Known Member
I thought you were mil too. I was wondering why you asked.
Jimmy_Norton
Well-Known Member
Maybe if we weren't sending poor kids off to fight unending meaningless nation building wars, they wouldn't feel the need to light aircraft carriers on fire.
Low_Level_Hell
Well-Known Member
If the current suspect did indeed commit arson, his reason to do so is probably the exact opposite.
USMCmech
Well-Known Member
There has been bitterly unhappy BUDS dropouts working crappy jobs on ships since before the Soviets tried nation building in Afganistan.
Don't forget the worlds most famous BUDS drop/champion poker player/king of Instagram, Dan Blizarian.
I could totally understand the background reading the command investigation.
The CDO was a 2d tour divo standing his first CDO watch - would put him/her right around a 23-24 year old LTJG with 2-3 years experience in the Navy- responsible for the the ship that Sunday morning.
36 people were directly responsible for the loss of the ship either through errors or lack of leadership or oversight.
news.usni.org
The CDO was a 2d tour divo standing his first CDO watch - would put him/her right around a 23-24 year old LTJG with 2-3 years experience in the Navy- responsible for the the ship that Sunday morning.
36 people were directly responsible for the loss of the ship either through errors or lack of leadership or oversight.
Long Chain of Failures Left Sailors Unprepared to Fight USS Bonhomme Richard Fire, Investigation Finds - USNI News
A cascade of failures – from a junior enlisted sailor not recognizing a fire at the end of their duty watch to fundamental problems with how the U.S. Navy trains sailors to fight fires in shipyards – are responsible for the five-day blaze that cost the service an amphibious warship, according to...
news.usni.org
Minuteman
“Dongola”
Wow!
While reading this, I had difficulty keeping in mind that people in the early moments did not know the correct response to multiple options; there were contractors and their equipment throughout the ship doing things that were already unusual.
But imagine being a San Diego firefighter deciding to go into a ship where you know fuel tanks and explosives are stored, but not really where and how much.
My understanding of fires on a ship are that, even if the spread of a fire through the open air or line-of-sight radiation can be blocked off, the metal of the ship's structure can conduct enough heat for things to catch fire in adjacent rooms.
While reading this, I had difficulty keeping in mind that people in the early moments did not know the correct response to multiple options; there were contractors and their equipment throughout the ship doing things that were already unusual.
But imagine being a San Diego firefighter deciding to go into a ship where you know fuel tanks and explosives are stored, but not really where and how much.
My understanding of fires on a ship are that, even if the spread of a fire through the open air or line-of-sight radiation can be blocked off, the metal of the ship's structure can conduct enough heat for things to catch fire in adjacent rooms.
USMCmech
Well-Known Member
Long Chain of Failures Left Sailors Unprepared to Fight USS Bonhomme Richard Fire, Investigation Finds - USNI News
A cascade of failures – from a junior enlisted sailor not recognizing a fire at the end of their duty watch to fundamental problems with how the U.S. Navy trains sailors to fight fires in shipyards – are responsible for the five-day blaze that cost the service an amphibious warship, according to...
Ouch!
That was painful to read. As usual, all the manuals and safety programs in the world are absolutely useless unless you train your people.
Normally for fires and smoke you have to set fire and smoke boundaries.
There were unable to do either one and due to confusion between the different fire agencies navy, fed fire, and SD fire over who was in charge (everyone thought someone else was in charge of the fire). ie who is flying the plane? the fire basically burned unabated for several hours before sometime took command. But the fire was fully developed by then.
Very painful read.
But now that I think back over my time in the Navy. The big assumption in all of the damage control drills I’ve ever run in the Navy is that you have a fully crewed damage control teams with full operational gear and command and control. I don’t recall ever doing damage control drills in a shipyard / major repair work going on or bug hole in the side engine room to allow engine room machinery to get craned on and off the ship.
Where the first thing we do for a fire in the engine room is secure ventilation to prevent air going in or out and then flood the space with halon. Hard to do when there’s a big hole in the side of the room. Though the Tripoli engine room fire showed us even when you don’t secure ventilation 2% halon is enough to suffocate a main engineering space fire with during maintence yard work going on.
There were unable to do either one and due to confusion between the different fire agencies navy, fed fire, and SD fire over who was in charge (everyone thought someone else was in charge of the fire). ie who is flying the plane? the fire basically burned unabated for several hours before sometime took command. But the fire was fully developed by then.
Very painful read.
But now that I think back over my time in the Navy. The big assumption in all of the damage control drills I’ve ever run in the Navy is that you have a fully crewed damage control teams with full operational gear and command and control. I don’t recall ever doing damage control drills in a shipyard / major repair work going on or bug hole in the side engine room to allow engine room machinery to get craned on and off the ship.
Where the first thing we do for a fire in the engine room is secure ventilation to prevent air going in or out and then flood the space with halon. Hard to do when there’s a big hole in the side of the room. Though the Tripoli engine room fire showed us even when you don’t secure ventilation 2% halon is enough to suffocate a main engineering space fire with during maintence yard work going on.
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This situation was a perfect storm of lack of personnel, lack of operable firefighting equipment, inability to seal spaces, and lack of command and control.
Once this fire got out of its incipient phase and began to grow, the ship spaces where fire was located essentially became furnaces within those spaces, with temperatures so high that they would be non-survivable for even fully outfitted fire crews.
Being in yard period, many of the ships DC repair lockers would likely be getting worked on, with missing equipment being replaced, etc. Fire mains getting worked on would have those out of service. Unlike using shore power, there’s no real immediate shore-supplied heavy firefighting resources available to attach to the ship such as high pressure water etc. There’s really only portable light-medium fire suppression systems that if they aren’t placed into operation quickly, any fire can spread beyond their capability to control them in short order.
The spaces and their heat inside, even with the ventilation of open hatches and such, would conduct heat to items in other spaces and ignite them. The ship would become a literal fun house of “what’s going to ignite next?” They are very lucky they didn’t have trapped fire crews in the maze of the ship while attempting to fight the fire with poor visibility and reach the seat-areas of the fires in the various spaces.
insofar as C&C, the ship’s DC officer or designee should have been the Incident Commander. This person has the intimate knowledge of the ships plans and design, and can best decide what needs to be done where and when. The Federal firefighters and the SD city firefighters are structural firefighters, not shipboard firefighters (unless some were prior USN and with the training), and they should’ve been utilized as backup to Damage Control-led teams of firefighting crews, not allowed to venture deep into the ship and it’s unfamiliar spaces and layout, on their own. The ship isn’t merely a “floating structure building”, it has challenges and gotcha’s all its own that make it very different from the standard structural firefighting that these shore-side crews are trained on. That could have been a recipe for disaster, and it was luck that it wasn’t. With all these problems and limitations, the fire crews as a whole couldn’t ever get ahead of the fire or cut it off at the pass, so to speak. And the fire took on a life of its own, early.
dustoff17
Still trying to reach the Top Shelf
A 20-year old Navy SEAL dropout has been charged with setting this fire. This is a great way to finish out your life…….. 
taskandpurpose.com
A 20-year-old Navy SEAL dropout is the sailor charged in the USS Bonhomme Richard fire
He lasted five days at BUD/S.
taskandpurpose.com
Minuteman
“Dongola”
My read of the ProPublica article is that Mays was disgruntled, had a reputation as a "loudmouth" about problems, and had previously attempted to be kicked out of the Navy. But also that a) a conclusion of arson was reached unusually quickly, b) there were several other, possibly more-likely suspect identified during the investigation, and c) there was a lack of evidence to indicate Mays did anything.
The Navy Accused Him of Arson. Its Own Investigation Showed Widespread Safety Failures.
After the USS Bonhomme Richard fire, investigators found missing fire hoses, a broken sprinkler system and other systemic failures. The Navy is still accusing a sailor of arson, against the advice of a military judge.
www.propublica.org
So I guess enjoy having a bunch of blackshoes stand on top of you as they distance themselves from the failure to convict for the remainder of your time in.
fholbert
Mod's - Please don't edit my posts!
I just wanted to repost my post from 14 months ago.
Wardogg
Meat Popsicle
What if the sailor charged in the Bonhomme Richard fire was actually a minor hero?
The prime suspect, now cleared, might just have been doing the right thing.
taskandpurpose.com
