The Navy’s report on the USS Guardian’s grounding off the Philippines condemns the ship’s senior officers for failures in leadership, even though the ship’s electronic charts had misplaced the Tubbataha reef by several miles.
Adm. Cecil D. Haney, commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, called the grounding a “tragic accident.”
“USS Guardian leadership and watch teams failed to adhere to prudent, safe, and sound navigation principles which would have alerted them to approaching dangers with sufficient time to take mitigating action,” Haney wrote in the 160-page report.
Haney said a “lack of leadership” led to the watch team’s disregard of visual cues, electronic cues and alarms in the hours leading up to the grounding, and that an ultimate reliance on what would turn out to be inaccurate Digital Nautical Charts (DNC) during the planning and execution of the navigation plan ultimately led to a degradation of the ship’s navigation ability.
The admiral praised the crew for its “heroic efforts” to save the ship, particularly the engineering and damage-control teams.
To read the complete report in PDF format, click on this link:
