> The 26-year-old officer of the deck, who was in charge of the destroyer at the time of the crash, had navigated the route only once before in daylight. In a panic, she ordered the Fitzgerald to turn directly into the path of the Crystal.
Just a random comment:
She may well have panicked, but depending on proximity, that may have been the correct move, if executed correctly and in time. In other words, the move may have come from training, and it may merely have been inconsequential if executed too late.
A ship turns by moving its back end left to turn right, and vice versa. That's how the rudder affects the ship. "Right full rudder" moves the back end left, pointing the entire ship in a more rightward direction.
I've directly observed this maneuver used in an emergency. I was enlisted, on a Knox class fast frigate. We were refueling underway next to an oiler. The two ships steam forward side by side, and lines are sent across, to eventually get hoses across from the oiler to the receiver (us).
One of our junior officers was in command. The captain was also on the bridge, observing and monitoring. I was there in case what I was responsible for broke, otherwise I wasn't normally on the bridge.
The junior officer allowed our ship to drift to the right, too close to the oiler. At some point the propellers of the large ship started to suck us in even closer.
The captain identified himself and declared himself in command, ordered right full rudder, toward the oiler, and full speed ahead. An alarm was also sounded, "emergency breakaway" or something like that. The maneuver immediately moved most of our ship away from the oiler, and we shot past the oiler (they were also executing their side of the emergency breakaway).
Not saying the two incidents are the same, only that "steering toward the other ship" wasn't necessarily the wrong maneuver. But they were doomed no matter what, as just about everything else relevant that could go wrong was or already had gone wrong.