Adjunct Professor and retired Navy captain Lawrence B. Brennan shares his insight on systemic problems in the Navy in the light of new findings on the USS Bonhomme destruction.
More than a year after arson destroyed a Navy warship, service leaders said Wednesday they are making changes and increasing oversight to correct widespread failures that led to the scrapping of the USS Bonhomme Richard.
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A report obtained by The Associated Press on Tuesday found that while the fire was deliberately set as the 840-foot (256-meter) amphibious assault vessel was docked in San Diego for a $250 million upgrade, it was lost due to repeated failures by an “inadequately prepared crew” unable to extinguish the blaze.
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Retired Navy Capt. Lawrence B. Brennan, a professor of international maritime law at Fordham University in New York, said the findings point to issues that the Navy has known about for decades.
“You can blame all the individuals you want but these are systemic problems,” he said. “Ships in the shipyard do not have adequate personnel or firefighting equipment to respond to the probable casualty. And this has been a long-standing problem.”
He said the loss of the Bonhomme Richard should force the Navy to better prepare its sailors to recognize the risks when a ship is docked. “It’s easy to spend time focusing on the arson allegation but that should not have resulted in the loss of any warship of this size,” he said.
