The captain of ACX Crystal has said that the USS Fitzgerald “suddenly” steamed on to a course to cross the path of the container ship and then failed to respond to warning signals or take evasive action to avoid the collision, which killed seven of the Fitzgerald‘s crew. The container ship steered hard to starboard to avoid the warship, but hit the Fitzgerald 10 minutes later at 1:30 a.m., according to a copy of Captain Ronald Advincula’s report to Japanese ship owner Dainichi Investment Corporation that was seen by Reuters.
The U.S. Navy declined to comment and there is no independent confirmation of the account. There are now at least six ongoing investigations into the collision which took place in clear weather south of Tokyo Bay in the early hours of June 17. The U.S. Navy has announced that Rear Adm. Brian Fort, formerly the commander of USS Gonzalez (DDG-66) and Destroyer Squadron 26, will head up one of the two Navy investigations into the collision.
Thanks to John and Sue Gregoire for contributing to this post.
Something went horribly wrong on the Fitzgerald. That many crew members that are that well trained to be a target and get rammed.
It is like everyone was asleep and using a Tesla cruise control.
EMP from a Chinese sub could have disabled Fitzgerald to allow the container ship to intentionally ram her.
“The US Navy declined to comment and there is no independent confirmation of the account”. But what’s that to keep every news outlet on the planet from parroting the same BS. What about bridge to bridge comms, the required 5 blasts on the ships horn, coming to a FULL STOP after impact, calling the CG immediately… No doubt the Captain was put up to this by his team of lawyers. Damn shysters, they’re all the same!
What was or was not done in those last 10 minutes will give us some answers. “In Extremis” gives both vessels the authority to avoid collision and take action.
Whatever the container ship did or did not do is irrelevant to the discussion of how a US Navy ship got rammed by a floating Winnebago the size of, and lit up like, the Empire State Building. Yo, hello, it’s a warship with a crew of hundreds, and the whole point is you’re not supposed to be able to sneak up and wreck them.
And I’ll bet we can safely infer certain contributing factors regarding the, uh, ethnic and/or gender makeup of the watchstander(s) in question if the final report is conspicuously lacking such data … you know, lest anyone might jump to conclusions. “Diversity is our strength” and all that
the captain is filipino; and filipinos, as a cultural attribute, generally are incapable of admitting blame, and place blame on others as an automatic, reflex response. the filipino captains statements should not be confused with facts and the investigation should be relied upon to sort out the facts. unfortunately, the current populist mood to reject reports from the media propaganda oligarchy in the US will cause many to speculate on a variety of alternate theories, and to refute facts claimed by investigators. for this reason, US Navy investigators should alter typical protocols and provide the public with proof and salient findings as they arise, and to anticipate the baised US media propaganda machine will distort and misrepresent findings, hence the need for press conferences on this highly sensitive incident.
I will wait until the facts are out. I see no reason to not believe the container ship captain. Your generalizations sound more like ethnic slurs to me.
What a bizarre and offensive comment. I have never seen an accident report that comments on the ethnic and gender make up of the crews involved.
The cases of meeting arrogant US Navy ships may be as many as your probs with Philippians.