|
Open-ended deployment: USN's LCS crew marooned in Singapore
The embarked crew of the littoral combat ship Coronado, forward deployed to Singapore, was supposed to be home for Thanksgiving after a four- or five-month tour. But now the crew has been on board and overseas for eight months and there is no end in sight.About 70 sailors compose Crew 204, which deployed in June for the Rim of the Pacific exercise and to replace the LCS Fort Worth at Changi Naval Base. But once the Coronado and her crew arrived in Singapore, the Navy’s top Surface Warfare Officer announced a sweeping overhaul to the LCS program's training standards that was spurred by a string of accidents, some of which were caused by crew errors. The shakeup has delayed getting the Coronado's replacement crew qualified and could extend the ship's deployment length to as long as a year, according to two family members who spoke to Navy Times. That would be one of the longest Navy deployments in decades. The fact that nobody knows exactly when it will end has eroded crew morale and put an enormous strain on families. Both family members, who spoke to Navy Times on condition of anonymity to avoid consequences for their loved ones, said the uncertainty had tanked the morale of the crew. A main factor driving Crew 204's open-ended deployment is the delay in getting a new crew qualified to replace them after a change in training standards. Qualifying under the new training standards requires some underway time. And to get underway, the crew, which will be Crew 203, needs a ship and for now all the trimaran LCS-2 variant ships are either in overhaul or undergoing repairs. Officials told Navy Times that the replacement crew should be training on the LCS Independence, but that ship is in need of engine repairs and is not immediately available. Navy officials say Crew 204’s open-ended deployment is an unintended consequence of the complete reorganization of the LCS program's manning program that was triggered last year by a spate of LCS engineering problems, including breakdowns on the Freedom and the Fort Worth caused by crew errors. In a December statement, SURFPAC spokesman Cmdr. John Perkins told Navy Times that the crew would be rotated home once its replacement is fully trained, but the word on the Coronado’s deckplates is that their replacements aren’t that close. “They were being told April, now they are being told mid-to-late May,” one of the family members said. “Truth seems to be that the replacement crew has made little-to-no progress." Posted by: Pappy 2017-02-22 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=481784 |