Adjunct Professor Lawrence Brennan was quoted in a Navy Times article about the collision and subsequent sinking of the frigate Helge Ingstad in early November.
To retired Capt. Lawrence Brennan, a career U.S. Navy attorney and now an instructor at Fordham University’s School of Law, what’s interesting isn’t just what’s in the interim report but what was left out and will be explored later by other probes.
He pointed to the crew of the frigate Helge Ingstad and wondered what condition they had set the frigate to mitigate or prevent flooding.
He asked about the shift change on the bridge that seemed to coincide with the frigate entering waters bustling with commercial shipping in low visibility.
He indicated that more will be learned from engineers poring over the gash in the hull, which “seemed to be opened up like a can opener,” and interviews with crew members who can trace the quick decision-making process of a watch team that realized, like aviators, that its vessel had “put itself in a box” and faced increasingly bad options as danger loomed.