11–20 of 143 posts
They should get Captain Marquet of "Turn the Ship Around!" to go get them ship shape. The book has some really good lessons on how shifting leadership style and culture can produce dramatically better results.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
After reading the article, no, the Navy probably does not need more overpaid business consultants with powerpoints full of easy answers. It needs to do something about inexperienced, undertrained, overworked crews in its ships. The CO and XO shouldn't be sleeping while their ship is crossing a busy sealane full of behemoth freighters driving on autopilot in the dark.
The CO and XO shouldn't be sleeping while their ship is crossing a busy sealane Why aren't these people "the best of the best", to quote the trite line from Top Gun? According to Wikipedia, the US Navy has 282 deployable combat vessels. It employs a total of 325,673 active duty personnel plus 270,265 civilian employees. So out of those 600,000 people, they can't find a few thousand who are willing, able, and capable…
Surface warfare officer is not the most desireable job for most people.
And it sucks so bad most people have much better options and leave after the initial five year commitment.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The CO and XO shouldn't be sleeping while their ship is crossing a busy sealane Why aren't these people "the best of the best", to quote the trite line from Top Gun? According to Wikipedia, the US Navy has 282 deployable combat vessels. It employs a total of 325,673 active duty personnel plus 270,265 civilian employees. So out of those 600,000 people, they can't find a few thousand who are willing, able, and capable…
Even the best of the best need to sleep.
The question isn't why one person is asleep, it's why there's nobody filling the role.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
After reading the article, no, the Navy probably does not need more overpaid business consultants with powerpoints full of easy answers. It needs to do something about inexperienced, undertrained, overworked crews in its ships. The CO and XO shouldn't be sleeping while their ship is crossing a busy sealane full of behemoth freighters driving on autopilot in the dark.
> The CO and XO shouldn't be sleeping The Navy deliberately understaffs their vessels to meet unrealistic budgets. Overwork, fatigue, mistakes, and catastrophe are the inevitable consequence. The only thing more predictable is the scapegoating of ship personnel and the untouchability of those who create the conditions which guarantee eventual disaster.
I always suspected this was partly because lots of sailors means a big navy base, and a big navy base means a booming local economy in that congressional district.
They should get Captain Marquet of "Turn the Ship Around!" to go get them ship shape. The book has some really good lessons on how shifting leadership style and culture can produce dramatically better results.
I'm amazed that serving naval officers flunked a quiz on the Rules of the Road, and even more amazed that the XO of the ship refused to take such a quiz. That's so basic. It's the driver's handbook for ships. See rules 11-19, which are about How Not To Run Into Other Ships. These are simple right of way rules. There's a one-page summary in "Power Boating for Dummies."[3] That anyone on the bridge of a US Navy vessel would not know these is terrifying. That the Navy brass tried to cover that up is worse.
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Its-Your-Ship-Management-Techniques-e...
[2] https://www.navcen.uscg.gov/pdf/navRules/navrules.pdf
[3] https://www.dummies.com/sports/following-right-of-way-boatin...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The CO and XO shouldn't be sleeping The Navy deliberately understaffs their vessels to meet unrealistic budgets. Overwork, fatigue, mistakes, and catastrophe are the inevitable consequence. The only thing more predictable is the scapegoating of ship personnel and the untouchability of those who create the conditions which guarantee eventual disaster.
My experience in the navy was the opposite: Ships were typically crewed with about 1.5X the number of sailors that were actually needed. I always suspected this was partly because lots of sailors means a big navy base, and a big navy base means a booming local economy in that congressional district.
>For nearly 30 years, all new surface warfare officers spent their first six months in uniform at the Surface Warfare Officer’s School in Newport, Rhode Island, learning the theory behind driving ships and leading sailors as division officers.
But that changed in 2003. The Navy decided to eliminate the “SWOS Basic” school and simply send surface fleet officers out to sea to learn on the job. The Navy did that mainly to save money, and the fleet has suffered severely for it, said retired Cmdr. Kurt Lippold.
“The Navy has cut training as a budgetary device and they have done it at the expense of our ability to operate safely at sea,” said Lippold, who commanded the destroyer Cole in 2000 when it was attacked by terrorists in Yemen.
https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2017/08/27/navy-swo...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
My experience in the navy was the opposite: Ships were typically crewed with about 1.5X the number of sailors that were actually needed. I always suspected this was partly because lots of sailors means a big navy base, and a big navy base means a booming local economy in that congressional district.
You're literally the only person I've ever seen make this claim. Why do we get so many stories of sleep deprived sailors if ships are over-crewed?
I was shocked to read above. You don't personally trust someone or people in CIC so you just don't communicate with CIC when you are crossing the most congested patch of ocean on the planet?
What is this? High school??
> The probe exposes how personal distrust led the officer of the deck, Lt. j.g. Sarah Coppock, to avoid communicating with the destroyer’s electronic nerve center — the combat information center, or CIC — while the Fitzgerald tried to cross a shipping superhighway. I was shocked to read above. You don't personally trust someone or people in CIC so you just don't communicate with CIC when you are crossing the most con…