Those are some serious accounts of criminal activity aboard US warships?

 

Gross stupidity and negligence, fraud, waste, and abuse maybe, but civilians don't fall under UCMJ.

 

Worth perusing:

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zon...to-change-that

Nor is this sort of cr@p limited to shipyards. This has been going on now for years:


https://www.overtdefense.com/2020/06...l-tank-debris/

I’m not sure why not leaving your bucking bars, riveting guns, spare rivets, and old Big Mac wrappers from your lunch in the fuel tanks should be such a difficult concept to get across...

 

I'm no Lindsey Graham. Just a lowly taxpayer/furry slipper patriot & trained risk assessment manager. Our Navy, our sailors. There's charges in there somewhere. Take away? If you see something, for chit's sake, say something. Thank you for your service.

 

Article suggest applying NNPS standards to the fleet... but nukes are screened heavily (top asvab for enlisted, most officers are STEM grads). Their training is lengthy, expensive and attrition-heavy. Then they have to pay massive bonuses for retention (highest paid mil professionals are not fighter pilots, they are submarine officers).

I expect (hope) to see some improvements to shipyard industrial hygiene standards out of this. Overdue IMO.

 

I was very junior at the time, and it was all reported to my CO at the am turnover. I'm confident he in turn reported it all, if for no other reason than CYA. Over the years I became aware that none of it was really unusual, although I haven't been aboard a ship in the yards in decades, or even at sea for years. Being in the yards was like being in training, the crew just wanted to let them get it done and get the hell out... cooperate to graduate if you will.

Sounds like some things haven't changed, although I'm sure there's been some improvement since the cold war era. One of the most egregious examples has not been repeated to my knowledge... hung over yard worker crawled up into a submarine ballast tank via the bottom vents to sleep it off. Boat was scheduled to float and get underway that day, he must have slept good because he missed the drydock flooding until it was too late.

 

My brother told me that it people smoking caught stuff on fire all the time on ships. I know they have designated "smoking areas", but the extent to which smoking is rampant in the military and anything associated with it, is absolutely staggering IME. It all kind of stems from the "don't worry about your body now, push it to the max", which includes drinking, medical issues that show up later in life, inappropriate diagnoses and treatments, and so on. Command does little to discourage it and they tend to see it as a "right" that these people "need to be able to smoke", so the inevitable outcome is fires caused by people smoking in areas they shouldn't be. Of course, there are plenty of other sources of fire...but this is one of the common ones...

 

Can these be extreme assignments? Oh yeah. For which, as you say, certain compensations are tacitly anticipated. Until an obvious transgression turns deadly for the non-complicit. Warships and warbirds are killing machines, as directed, whenever combat maneuvers move past exercise? Sophisticated systems got to perform. We all see the photo of the Lt. posted. Achiever, ring knocker, cool flight suit. How busting with pride her family must be. Still, as Badflaps alluded, the right time comes, just like all gunmen, can't lose too much sleep over dropping Bambi's mom yesterday. The duty call quote by Adm. Dunn to 'go forth and kick butt' seems a tad rosy.

 

To use a "Navyism" I wish the PIO had waited till she had a little more water under her keel.

 

In my experience, most fires were electrical in origin not counting the monthly grease fire in the galley during high seas or angles. Salt air and metal electrical fixtures just don't play well. Frankly sailors (at sea or in port) just don't leave piles of flammable trash laying around, at least not in my 35 years of experience in the all-volunteer force.

Smoking is on it's way out in the mil, and smokeless is not far behind, although I'm not sure if a total ban is in the near-term cards given the demographics and attitudes you mentioned. It's pretty much already banned indoors or inside ships, which means people on small ships or subs have to go smokeless since you can't be outside the hull during certain operational conditions.

Although smoking (and screwing) in fan rooms has always been a thing, although nothing inside a big metal fan box should burn.

Also alcohol abuse went from encouraged to tolerated, to discouraged, to actual mild institutional disapproval of any alcohol consumption. The tides are shifting for sure, the USN gyms used to be fairly open, mostly a few muscleheads and whatever divers, marines, firemen, etc. were stationed nearby. Now (pre-covid) they're full of junior and mid-grade enlisted plus their spouses. Sat AM used to be a great time to have a mil gym to yourself, but not any more. I'm not complaining though, glad to see the younger folks enjoying a healthy lifestyle.

Was your brother in prior to 2010?