ARLINGTON, Va. — The U.S. Navy’s top enlisted leader said the COVID-19 pandemic is teaching the sea service that personnel need as much focus as machines as the Navy works its way to separate processes that work from those that need to be cast aside. 

Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy (MCPON) Russell Smith spoke July 15 during a webinar, NatSec 2020: Coronavirus and Beyond, co-sponsored by the Navy League of the United States, the Association of the United States Army and Government Matters. 

“We knew going in that we were going to find some better practices, some efficiencies with the way we do business,” Smith said. 

He noted that the Navy’s recruit training center at Great Lakes, Illinois, “has had [fewer] cases of pneumonia, severe flu and hospitalizations than we’ve ever had right now, even in COVID, because of the way we’ve handled people and the way we’ve prevented that inter-exchange of colds and things that all happen when so many people from so many different parts of the country all come together and start sharing their germs.” 

“The way we handled things from a hygiene perspective and some other efficiencies that we certainly learned in this process of bringing [recruits] in will probably stick,” he said.  

“That’s the COVID writ large for us as a Navy,” he said. “We’ve absolutely learned some things that we stopped doing because of COVID that we probably won’t start doing again. Some things we’ll have to go right back to doing as soon as we can, but there are some things — by not having to do them for a while — as an efficiency, we probably don’t need to go back to doing [them].”  

“Where there is challenge, there is opportunity,” said Navy League Executive Director Mike Stevens, Smith’s predecessor as MCPON, also speaking in the webinar. “What I’ve seen in both the private sector and in [the Department of Defense] taking the challenge, looking for these new opportunities, and, primarily where we capitalize on these opportunities in the areas of technology, I think those thing are going to stick.” 

“We’ve learned how to work efficiently from places other than our normal places of duty or work,” Stevens said. “We’re much more effective than I thought we would be.”  

Smith pointed out that the Navy is an expeditionary service, “and when we immediately moved to nearly everyone teleworking, we found out how much our basic services lack the agility that they require for us to dis-aggregate and work remotely. We have to be able to do that far better than we do today. A lot of these forced processes made us catch up quickly.”

ARLINGTON, Va. — The number of personnel testing positive for COVID-19 at U.S. Marine Corps bases on Okinawa has grown to 136, according to the provincial governor of the Japanese island.

Gov. Denny Tamaki told reporters in Tokyo that another 36 cases have been reported at Camp Hansen, one of the first two facilities reporting novel coronavirus-positive clusters on Okinawa, the Associated Press reported July 16.

Like many Okinawans, Tamaki has been critical of the large U.S. military presence there, citing increased noise, crime, and aircraft accidents. He flew to Tokyo to complain to Japanese Defense Minister Taro Kono that he was not getting enough information about the outbreaks among Marines on Okinawa and asked Kono to urge the U.S. military to be more cooperative.

In keeping with U.S. Defense Department policy, the Marine Corps itself will not disclose how many Marines and Sailors on Okinawa are infected, but they have been sharing that information with health officials in the Okinawa Provincial Government. A Marine official has said the numbers Tamaki has been giving to the news media have been accurate.

In addition to outbreaks at Camp Hansen and Marine Corps Air Station Futenma, which the Marine Corps has acknowledged, Tamaki said others included Camp Kinser and Camp McTureous. The Kinser and McTureous cases did not constitute additional outbreaks, the Marines maintained.

The Camp McTureous case “was directly related to someone returning from the U.S. That person didn’t test positive until showing symptoms and being tested shortly after returning home. All residents of that home were isolated upon return and that was an isolated case,” Maj. Kenneth Kunze, a spokesperson for Marine Corps Installations Pacific (MCIPAC), said in a statement. Likewise, the other case “involved a resident of Camp Kinser, but that case was related to the Camp Hansen cluster and was not a new or different outbreak,” Kunze said.

On July 11, MCIPAC ordered an enhanced lockdown at all Marine installations across Okinawa. That included closing all nonessential facilities and limiting mess halls, exchanges, commissaries, base restaurants and food courts to take-out service. The new restrictions apply to all uniformed and civilian Marine personnel based on Okinawa.

Meanwhile, a member of the Marine Rotational Force Darwin, in Australia’s Northern Territory, has tested positive for COVID-19 as well.

The infected Marine arrived with the most recent wave of Marines on July 8. All the others received initial negative results, following a strict 14-day quarantine in barracks upon arrival in Australia, according to an announcement posted July 10 on the Rotational Force’s Facebook page.

The Marine is currently under strict isolation at Royal Darwin Hospital and the Northern Territory government is providing support. All those who may have interacted with the infected Marine have been identified and placed under quarantine for a minimum of 14-days and will receive additional testing.

Medical specialists will continue to monitor the health of all Marines. Should the condition of any become serious, they will be to Royal Darwin Hospital for follow on observation, testing and treatment, the announcement said.

The Marine Corps has been deploying Marines to northern Australia for an annual six-month rotation since 2012, but this year’s deployment was postponed in March over concerns about possible COVID-19 exposure. The decision to resume in May came after Australia granted an exemption to its travel restrictions.

ARLINGTON, Va. — Capt. Brett Crozier, the former skipper of the first U.S. Navy warship to suffer a novel coronavirus outbreak at sea, wasn’t restored to command last week as many had expected following a weeks-long investigation, but the detailed report on the affair spreads fault to other officers as well in the response to the outbreak that infected hundreds, hospitalized several and killed one Sailor.

Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Gilday and new Navy Secretary Kenneth J. Braithwaite announced the decision on June 19 at a Pentagon press briefing on the results of the USS Theodore Roosevelt Command Investigation, which was begun April 2, the day Crozier was fired. The probe was conducted by Vice Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Robert Burke.

That day, Gilday said he would not reassign Crozier as the commanding officer of the nuclear aircraft carrier, “nor will he be eligible for future command. Capt. Crozier will be reassigned.”

Gilday also said the promotion of Crozier’s immediate superior, Rear Adm. Stuart Baker, commander of the Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group, to a second star was being put on hold “pending further review.”

The investigation’s 81-page report also faults the actions of the carrier’s air wing commander and the TR’s medical officer during the outbreak. Gilday said those officers would be subject to administrative action by Adm. John Aquilino, the Pacific Fleet’s commander. Gilday also criticized a breakdown in communications with the U.S. 7th Fleet staff, leading to mistrust among the Theodore Roosevelt’s leadership.

The investigation also ruled out resupply flights to the carrier from the Philippines as the source of the COVID-19 outbreak aboard, leading officials to conclude the ship’s port visit to Da Nang, Vietnam, likely was the cause of infection among crew members.

However, both Gilday and the report took pains to explain why no one — including commanders of the Pacific Fleet and U.S. Indo-Pacific Command — was disciplined for ordering a port call to a country where dozens of COVID-19 cases had been reported.

The cases were all in the Hanoi area, 450 miles north of Da Nang, and both the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization advised Navy planners that Vietnam was — and remains — transparent and reliable in its outbreak reporting.

Also, several precautionary measures were taken, including briefing the TR’s crew to the risks, checking their symptoms before they left the ship and upon their return, Gilday said. Only locations approved by the State Department could be visited and crew members were not allowed to buy food in port. “Based upon the pre-event risk analysis, the decision to execute the Da Nang port visit was appropriate,” the report concluded, adding: “The visit was executed with sensible precautions, based on the world’s understanding of COVID-19 at the time.”

Braithwaite, who took office just a month ago, said he fully supported the report’s findings and recommendations. He also said he had received “no communication whatsoever with anybody at the White House” and had discussed the controversial decision not to reinstate Crozier only up the chain of command to Defense Secretary Mark Esper.

The 81-page report may not be the end of the saga, however.

The chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), said his committee will launch an investigation into the Theodore Roosevelt’s COVID-19 outbreak “in order to better understand the full range of mistakes that were made throughout the entire chain of command.”

Gilday’s Change of Heart on Crozier

Gilday conceded that he previously believed Crozier should be reinstated after conducting an initial investigation following the captain’s removal, but that a wider investigation had a much deeper scope.

“It is my belief that both Admiral Baker and Capt. Crozier fell well short of what we expect of those in command,” he said at the June 19 briefing.

“Had I known then what I know today, I would not have made that recommendation to reinstate Capt. Crozier. Moreover, if Capt. Crozier were still in command today, I would be relieving him,” Gilday added.

Gilday’s mind was changed, he said, by the investigation’s conclusion that the carrier’s captain and the strike force commander “did not do enough, soon enough” to prevent the spread of COVID-19 aboard the Theodore Roosevelt.

Missteps included not enforcing physical distancing in many public areas of the carrier once crew began testing positive and releasing quarantined crew from the carrier’s aft section to ease crowding conditions.

The 81-page report may not be the end of the story. The House Armed Services Committee will launch its own probe into the outbreak.

Once portside in Guam, Crozier did not “forcefully and expeditiously execute the best possible and available plan” for evacuating the ship’s crew.
Instead, Gilday maintained, Crozier focused on obtaining single-room occupancy hotel rooms with separate bathrooms, in compliance with CDC recommendations, rather than moving crew to hundreds of beds spaced 6 feet apart in Naval Base Guam facilities as well as unoccupied hotel rooms and barracks on base and ships in port with extra berth space.

Crozier was relieved of command April 2 by then acting Navy Secretary Thomas B. Modly after a March 30 letter that Crozier wrote to top Navy officers and fellow naval aviators, pleading for faster intervention from his superiors to assist his crew, was leaked to a San Francisco newspaper.

In the letter, which was sent, unencrypted, via e-mail, Crozier expressed alarm over the slow pace of disembarking his crew at Naval Base Guam while the virus spread rapidly on the ship. Publication of the letter in the San Francisco Chronicle sparked an outcry and worldwide media attention over the captain’s actions and the fate of the carrier’s crew.

The decision not to reassign Crozier to command either afloat or ashore was not based on the letter nor its contents, Gilday said. Rather, the investigation found it was unnecessary because higher commands were already responding to Crozier’s requests to find sufficient places to lodge crew members on Guam.

A deal brokered by Guam’s Gov. Lou Guerrero to place thousands of Sailors in hotels there was closed six hours before Crozier sent his letter. Not only did the letter not speed up the crew disembarkation, the tone caused problems for Guerrero, whose constituents feared depositing thousands of Sailors and Marines, many of whom might have been infected, on Guam.

Gilday said Crozier did not have his facts straight when he sent his letter up the chain of command and confused the situation by skipping over the 7th Fleet.

Pressed by reporters asking if Crozier was being held to a higher standard than the commanders who authorized the TR’s stop in Vietnam, Gilday said he didn’t think so.

“If I take a look at what Crozier was dealing with and yes, we had a lot of questions at that time about the transmission of asymptomatic cases,” Gilday said, adding “[but] we surely knew that we were in a better place getting those people off the ship. So even given what we didn’t understand about COVID, we understood that.”

Eventually, 1,100 of the Theodore Roosevelt’s nearly 5,000 crew members — including Crozier himself — tested positive for COVID-19. Only a fraction required hospitalization, but one Sailor, Aviation Ordnanceman CPO Charles Thacker Jr., did succumb to the virus.

TR Affair Forces Examination of Pacific Fleet Chain of Command

Crozier was hailed as a hero by his crew — who were seen on video cheering for him as he departed the ship in Guam — while others criticized the captain for circumventing the chain of command.

Modly said at the time that Crozier was not fired in retaliation for his letter but because the secretary had lost confidence in the captain’s leadership. Crozier, Modly said, had allowed the complexity of the COVID-19 challenge “to overwhelm his ability to act professionally, when acting professionally was what was needed.”

However, Modly complicated matters by flying to Guam to defend his actions in an April 6 profanity-laced address to the TR’s crew. Modly called Crozier “too naive or too stupid to be the commanding officer of a ship like this,” according transcripts of the Navy secretary’s remarks made by several crew members. Less than 24 hours after the speech, Modly issued an apology to Crozier, the Theodore Roosevelt’s crew and the Navy, and offered his resignation to Defense Secretary Mark Esper, who accepted it.

Gilday directed Burke to investigate the circumstances and climate of the entire Pacific Fleet affecting the chain of command. Previously, Gilday spoke of “a potential comms breakdown, wherever it occurred,” adding: “We’re not looking to shoot the messenger here, we want to get this right.”

The completed initial report was delivered April 24 to Modly’s replacement, acting Navy Secretary James McPherson, who directed Gilday to conduct the second probe, saying he had “unanswered questions that the preliminary inquiry has identified and that can only be answered by a deeper review.”

COVID-19 was detected on board the aircraft carrier in late March, 15 days after the TR made the Da Nang port visit. Stopping at Guam for a scheduled visit on March 27, Crozier began disembarking crew as the number of Sailors testing positive for the virus continued to rise. Finding suitable accommodations for thousands of personnel on the island was a slow process.

In his letter, Crozier said the carrier had inadequate space to isolate or quarantine Sailors. “We are not at war. Sailors do not need to die,” he wrote. “If we do not act now, we are failing to properly take care of our most trusted asset — our Sailors.”

Testing the entire crew for COVID-19 was completed in mid-May. They began returning to the carrier in waves after 14 days of isolation and after twice testing negative for the virus. Despite those efforts, at least 14 returning Sailors tested positive again for COVID-19. Following a bow-to-stern deep-cleaning process by about 700 crew members and recertifying aviation activities for its Carrier Air Wing 11, the carrier left Guam and resumed it mission on June 4.

ARLINGTON, Va. — Capt. Brett Crozier, the embattled former skipper of the first U.S. Navy warship to suffer a novel coronavirus outbreak at sea, will not be restored to command of the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt, top Navy leaders announced June 19.

Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Gilday and Navy Secretary Kenneth J. Braithwaite announced the decision at a Pentagon press briefing on the results of the USS Theodore Roosevelt Command Investigation, begun April 2, the day Crozier was fired. The investigation was conducted by Vice Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Robert Burke.

Gilday said he would not reassign Crozier as the commanding officer of the ship known as the TR, “nor will he be eligible for future command. Capt. Crozier will be reassigned.” Gilday also said the promotion of Crozier’s immediate superior, Rear Adm. Stuart Baker, the Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group commander, to a second star was being put on hold “pending further review.”

Braithwaite, who was sworn into office just three weeks ago, said he fully supported the report’s findings and recommendations and “I am satisfied that it was conducted in an extremely thorough and fair.”

Gilday conceded that he previously believed that Crozier should be reinstated after conducting an initial investigation following Crozier’s removal, but a wider investigation had a much deeper scope.

“It is my belief that both Admiral Baker and Capt. Crozier fell well short of what we expect of those  in command,” he said. “Had I known then what I know today, I would not have made that recommendation to reinstate Capt. Crozier. Moreover, if Capt. Crozier were still in command today, I would be relieving him,” Gilday added.

Crozier was relieved of command April 2 by then acting Navy Secretary Thomas B. Modly after a March 30 letter that Crozier wrote to top Navy officers and fellow naval aviators, pleading for faster intervention from his superiors to assist his crew, was leaked to a San Francisco newspaper.

In the letter, which was sent, unencrypted, via email, Crozier expressed alarm over the slow pace of disembarking his crew at Naval Base Guam while the coronavirus spread rapidly on the ship, also known as the TR. Publication of the letter in the San Francisco Chronicle sparked an outcry and worldwide media attention over Crozier’s actions and the fate of the carrier’s crew.

Eventually, 1,100 of the TR’s nearly 5,000 crewmembers, including Crozier himself, tested positive for COVID-19. Only a fraction required hospitalization, but one Sailor, Aviation Ordnanceman CPO Charles Thacker Jr., succumbed to the virus.

Crozier was hailed as a hero by his crew — who were seen on video cheering for him as he departed the ship in Guam — while others criticized him for circumventing the Navy’s chain of command. Modly said Crozier was not fired in retaliation for his letter but because the secretary had lost confidence in the captain’s leadership. Crozier, he said, had allowed the complexity of the COVID-19 challenge “to overwhelm his ability to act professionally, when acting professionally was what was needed.”

However, Modly complicated matters by flying to Guam, to defend his actions in an April 6 profanity laced address to the TR’s crew. Modly called Crozier “too naive or too stupid to be the commanding officer of a ship like this,” according transcripts of recordings of Modly’s remarks made by several of the carrier’s crew.

Less than 24 hours after the speech, Modly issued an apology to Crozier, the Roosevelt’s crew and the Navy, and offered his resignation to Defense Secretary Mark Esper, who accepted it.

Gilday directed Burke, the vice CNO, to investigate the circumstances and climate of the entire Pacific Fleet affecting the chain of command. Previously, Gilday spoke of “a potential comms breakdown, wherever it occurred,” adding “we’re not looking to shoot the messenger here, we want to get this right.”

The completed report was delivered April 24 to Modly’s replacement, acting Navy Secretary James McPherson, who directed Gilday to conduct a second investigation, saying he had “unanswered questions that the preliminary inquiry has identified and that can only be answered by a deeper review.”  

COVID-19 was detected on board the aircraft carrier in late March, 15 days after the TR made a port call to Da Nang, Vietnam, the Navy announced March 24. Stopping at Guam for a scheduled visit on March 27, Crozier began disembarking crewmembers as the number of Sailors testing positive continued to rise. Finding suitable accommodations for thousands of personnel on the island was a slow process.

In his letter, Crozier said the carrier had inadequate space to isolate or quarantine Sailors. “We are not at war. Sailors do not need to die,” Crozier wrote. “If we do not act now, we are failing to properly take care of our most trusted asset — our Sailors.”

Testing the entire crew for COVID-19 was completed in mid-May and they began returning to the carrier in waves after 14-days’ isolation and twice testing negative for the virus. Despite those efforts, at least 14 returning Sailors tested positive again for COVID-19. Following a bow-to-stern deep-cleaning process by about 700 crew members, and recertifying aviation activities for its Carrier Air Wing 11, the TR left Guam and resumed it mission on June 4.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — The crew of the Coast Guard cutter Donald Horsley offloaded about 150 kilograms of seized cocaine and transferred custody of three suspected smugglers to federal law enforcement authorities on June 13, the Coast Guard 7th District said in a release. 

The seized drug shipment has an estimated value of more than $5.6 million. The three men apprehended remain in U.S. custody facing criminal charges for drug smuggling. 

The interdiction was the result of ongoing efforts in support of Operation Unified Resolve, the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) program and the Caribbean Corridor Strike Force (CCSF). Prosecution is being led by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Puerto Rico. 

“COVID-19 has presented us with tremendous operational and personal challenges over these past few months and yet the great women and men of the United States Coast Guard continue to do an outstanding job safeguarding this great nation,” said Lt. Joel Wyman, commanding officer of the cutter Winslow Griesser, which carried out the interdiction. 

The interdiction and seizure occurred during a patrol the night of June 8, where the crew of a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) maritime patrol aircraft detected a suspected go-fast vessel with three people aboard about 50 nautical miles southwest of Isla Saona, Dominican Republic. Coast Guard watchstanders at Sector San Juan directed the launch of a Coast Guard HC-144 Ocean Sentry aircraft to acquire the location of the vessel and diverted the Winslow Griesser. 

Once on scene, Winslow Griesser’s over-the-horizon cutter boat stopped the vessel and recovered three bales from the water near it. The recovered bales tested positive for cocaine and weighed about 150 kilograms.  

The detainees and contraband were transferred to the Donald Horsley for transport to Sector San Juan. The cutter’s crew offloaded the contraband and disembarked the suspected smugglers in coordination with CBP officers, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, DEA and CCSF special agents in San Juan. 

PASCAGOULA, Miss. — The guided-missile destroyer USS Fitzgerald departed Huntington Ingalls Industries’ Ingalls Shipbuilding shipyard on June 13 to return to its homeport in San Diego, Naval Sea Systems Command said in a release. 

The sail away reflects more than two years of effort in restoring and modernizing one of the Navy’s most capable warships after it was damaged during a collision in 2017 that claimed the lives of seven Sailors. 

“Today the ‘Fighting Fitz’ is returning to the Pacific Fleet as one of our nation’s most capable warfighting platforms, marking a significant step in her return to warfighting readiness,” said Rear Adm. Eric Ver Hage, director of surface ship maintenance and modernization and commander of the Navy Regional Maintenance Center. “The Fitzgerald sailors, our Navy project teams, and the men and women of Ingalls put forth a tremendous effort to restore the ship to fighting shape and did so on schedule.” 

To restore the impacted spaces to full operations and functionality, various hull, mechanical and electrical, combat system and command, control, communications, computers and intelligence repairs and upgrades were completed. This work ranged from partial to complete refurbishment of impacted spaces to replacement of equipment such as the radar and electronic warfare suite. 

Due to the extent and complexity of the restoration, both repair and new construction procedures were used to accomplish the restoration and modernization efforts. Throughout this restoration, the U.S. Navy made it a priority to ensure the Fitzgerald returned to a peak state of warfighting readiness to contribute to an agile and dynamic fleet. 

The Fitzgerald’s crew completed multiple training and certification events, such as navigation assessment and light off assessment (LOA), to ensure the crew was at peak readiness to operate the ship as it returns to homeport. 

“Completing repairs and upgrades to Fitzgerald was only possible because of the outstanding teamwork between the government and industry teams over the last 2 1/2 years,” said Cmdr. Scott Wilbur, commanding officer of the Fitzgerald. “My thanks go out to everyone involved in making sure the ship is ready, and I’m especially proud of my crew’s hard work ensuring we are trained and prepared to take our ship back to sea.”  

Prior to departing Pascagoula for San Diego, the Fitzgerald’s crew began a pre-movement sequester on May 23 in accordance with U.S. Navy pre-deployment guidelines — compliance with Navy and CDC guidance is critical to minimize the spread of COVID-19. 

The Fitzgerald is assigned to Destroyer Squadron (DESRON) 1 and upon return to her homeport in San Diego, crew training and certifications will commence in support of basic phase training. 

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Navy is mobilizing 1,629 Reservists to support aircraft carrier and submarine maintenance at its four public shipyards starting in July, Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) said in a release. This mobilization will help reduce the maintenance backlog that has developed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

NAVSEA authorized weather and safety leave for shipyard personnel who fell under the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) “high risk” category for extreme complications tied to the COVID-19 virus. With up to 25% of the production workforce unable to report to their duty location, the shipyards have not been able to execute all their work and have built a backlog of work that, if left unchecked, would result in delays in returning ships to the fleet.  

The Reservists are all part of the Navy’s Surge Maintenance, or SurgeMain, program. Established in 2005, SurgeMain has 2,200 enlisted Reserve Sailors and 240 Reserve officers across 75 units and was created to augment the Navy’s organic civilian shipyard workforce in times of need. 

SurgeMain Sailors have technical and trade backgrounds that allow them to have an immediate impact at the shipyards. 

“Our Sailors are electricians, pipe fitters, sheet metal workers, plumbers, hydraulic technicians, mechanics, machinists, carpenters, welders and more,” said Capt. Michael P. MacLellan, SurgeMain’s national director. “Many of our people have prior experience at the shipyard where they’re being sent, down to the specific shop where they will be working alongside the shipyard’s organic civilian workforce.”  

This is the first time SurgeMain has activated this many Reservists at one time. 

“We’re excited to mobilize and execute the mission for which we’ve been training,” MacLellan said. “This deployment presents a valuable opportunity for our Sailors to hone their skills, contribute to our national defense and allow us to gain valuable lessons you can only learn during mass mobilization.” 

SurgeMain Reservists will start arriving at their respective shipyards in phases starting in early July, with all 1,629 Sailors onsite by September. They will be functioning on one-year mobilization orders that may be extended or curtailed should circumstances change. 

Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine, will receive 267 Reservists; Norfolk Naval Shipyard in Portsmouth, Virginia, will receive 486; Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility in Bremerton, Washington, will receive 676; and Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii, will receive 200. 

“We have been methodical in how we planned this mobilization,” said Vice Adm. Tom Moore, NAVSEA’s commander. “We did not mobilize anyone who already works in the ship maintenance or construction field, and we worked to place people into shipyards where they have previously drilled so there was a built-in comfort factor for both the Reservist and the shipyard personnel.” 

Once mobilized, the Reservists will abide by all Defense Department travel restrictions and protocols tied to minimizing the spread of COVID-19. Sailors are being assigned to their designated Reserve duty location, which is usually the shipyard closest to where they live. 

Once at their designated shipyard, Sailors will abide by all COVID-19 policies. These include conducting a daily self-screening and undergoing a temperature check prior to accessing the shipyard, wearing all required personal protective equipment and following the same social distancing measures as the rest of the shipyard workforce.

ARLINGTON, Va. — The most recent U.S. Navy warship to detect COVID-19 among crew members, the amphibious dock landing ship USS Carter Hall has been cleaned and sanitized and awaits a decision to move the crew back on board, according to a Navy spokesperson.

Several crew members tested positive for the novel coronavirus on May 23, at Carter Hall’s homeport, Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek-Fort Story, Virginia, as the ship prepared for duty as a standby surge force for this year’s Atlantic Coast hurricane season. Under Defense Department policy, the Navy does not report the number of COVID-19 cases detected on specific ships and other units.

Most of the approximately 400 Sailors and Marines assigned to the ship were moved ashore to barracks or hotel rooms at Navy installations in the Norfolk, Virginia, area, according to Lt. Commander Amelia Umayam, a U.S. Fleet Forces Command spokesperson. A portion of the crew remained on board to perform cleaning, maintenance and in-port watchstanding duties.

“The crew has been monitored by medical personnel and are receiving care as necessary. No Carter Hall crewmembers have been admitted to the hospital,” Umayam said in an emailed statement June 9.

She declined to discuss a specific timeline for restoring the Carter Hall to duty but noted “the ship has been thoroughly cleaned and sanitized, and we plan to move the crew back aboard the ship as soon as possible.”

While ashore, crew members are being checked daily by their leadership and receiving deliveries of food and essential items. The entire crew, as well as the Marines assigned to the 609-foot, 16,700-ton Carter Hall, have been tested for COVID-19, she said. In addition to crew members, the Carter Hall can carry a complement of 400 Marines and two air cushion landing craft.

ARLINGTON, Va. — Another novel coronavirus outbreak has been reported on a U.S. Navy warship in port: the amphibious dock landing ship USS Carter Hall.

The Carter Hall’s crew of 400 was being tested for COVID-19 as a proactive measure to ensure its Sailors were a healthy, surge-capable response force for the upcoming hurricane season when several tested positive for the virus on May 23, Lt. Commander Amelia Umayam, a Fleet Force spokesperson in Norfolk, Va., confirmed in an e-mailed statement. As a matter of Defense Department policy, Umayam declined to confirm the number of cases detected on the dock landing ship.

“The crew moved ashore to begin a restriction of movement (ROM) per current Navy guidance. The crew members who have been moved ashore are being checked on each day by their leadership and are receiving deliveries of food and essential items,” according to the statement.

As of June 4, the Navy still stood as the U.S. military service with the largest number of COVID-19 cases at 2,520. That compares to 6,919 for all other services and Defense Department agencies combined. The U.S. Marine Corps has had 581 cases. The Navy reported 728 active cases among uniformed personnel, only one hospitalized and 1,791 Sailors who have recovered from the virus. The Pentagon said it anticipates providing updated numbers only until August, when it will evaluate whether such reporting is still necessary.

The 609-foot, 16,700-ton Carter Hall, which can carry a complement of 400 Marines and two air cushion landing craft, remains at Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek-Fort Story, Virginia.

“A portion of the crew remains on board the ship to clean and maintain in port watchstanding requirements, and they’re enforcing social distancing, minimizing group gatherings, wearing PPE, and cleaning/sanitizing extensively as well as reporting up their chain of command, if they feel ill,” the statement continued.

Meanwhile, the first Navy warship to experience a COVID-19 outbreak while at sea, the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt, on June 4 left Guam — where it had been sidelined for more than two months — to continue its scheduled deployment in the 7th Fleet area of operations in the Indo-Pacific.

COVID-19 was detected on board the carrier in late March, 15 days after the ship made a port call to Da Nang, Vietnam. Stopping at Guam for a scheduled visit on March 27, most of the nearly 5,000 crew were disembarked to self-isolate or receive medical treatment, while about 700 remained on board to clean the ship from bow to stern. About 1,100 crew members became infected and several were hospitalized. One Theodore Roosevelt Sailor, Aviation Ordnanceman CPO Charles Thacker Jr., died of complications from the virus.

Testing the entire crew for COVID-19 was completed in mid-May, and they began returning to the carrier in waves after 14 days of isolation and twice testing negative for the virus. Despite those efforts, at least 14 returning Sailors tested positive again.

On May 21, the Theodore Roosevelt began a short shakedown cruise to recertify aviation activities for Carrier Air Wing 11, which was completed June 2. After returning to Guam to pick up remaining Sailors who had tested negative for COVID-19, the carrier departed Guam’s Apra Harbor, flying the iconic “Don’t Give Up the Ship” flag from the port yardarm.

Sailors who did not meet the return-to-work criteria and still require additional time ashore to recover will remain in isolation on Naval Base Guam, according to Commander J. Myers Vasquez, a spokesperson for the commander, U.S. Pacific Fleet. “Once recovered, air transportation will be coordinated to move the Sailors onboard Theodore Roosevelt or to their final duty station once TR departs the area on mission,” Vasquez said in a June 3 statement.

The Roosevelt returned to service while Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Mike Gilday mulls the fate of the carrier’s former skipper, Capt. Brett Crozier, who was relieved of command on April 2 after a letter he wrote to Navy leadership — pleading for faster intervention from the chain of command to assist his crew — was leaked to a San Francisco newspaper and subsequently received worldwide media attention. The Navy investigated the command climate in the Pacific and how it could have contributed to the handling of the outbreak and Crozier. The results of that investigation have been delivered to Gilday.

Lessons learned from the Theodore Roosevelt outbreak were cited by Pentagon officials among the reasons for the swift response to an outbreak on the Arleigh-Burke class guided-missile destroyer USS Kidd — none of whose crew needed hospitalization.

The Kidd was participating in counter-narcotics operations in the U.S. Southern Command area of responsibility in the Pacific in late April when several of its Sailors began exhibiting flu-like symptoms.

ARLINGTON, Va. — Sidelined pier-side for nearly two months after an outbreak of COVID-19 infected 1,100 crew members, hospitalized several and killed one, the USS Theodore Roosevelt sailed from Naval Base Guam on May 21 on a test run to ensure the carrier’s aircraft and personnel are ready to resume their mission.

The Nimitz-class aircraft carrier, the first Navy warship to endure an outbreak of the virus at sea, is underway to begin a 10- to 14-day “shakedown cruise type of activity” that includes recertifying Carrier Air Wing 11, the ship’s flight deck and the crew, Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Rath Hoffman told media assembled there.

See: More Returning Theodore Roosevelt Sailors Test Positive for COVID-19

After the air wing completes carrier qualification flights, the Theodore Roosevelt will return to Guam to pick up remaining crew members who have been quarantined while recovering from the virus, Hoffman said, adding that there’s been no change in the carrier’s mission to the Indo-Pacific.

The Navy has learned a lot about social distancing, the wearing of face coverings, frequent testing and temperature surveillance since the first cases appeared aboard the carrier in March, Hoffman said, but “no one going into this believes this is the last we’ve seen of [the] coronavirus.”

Nevertheless, “We’re not going leave our ships in port. We’re not going stand down. We’re going to continue to sail, continue to patrol,” he added.

After moving nearly 4,000 crew members off the ship and cleaning the entire vessel from bow to stern, hundreds of crew, enough to operate the ship while it is underway, have returned from quarantine after passing rigorous return-to-work criteria. Scaled-back manning allowed the ship to bring on board the right makeup of personnel required to safely operate and complete a particular mission requirement, according to a Navy statement.

“We are scaling our manning on board based on our mission requirement,” said Capt. Carlos Sardiello, the Theodore Roosevelt’s commanding officer. “Carrier qualification requires fewer personnel than other missions and bringing fewer Sailors on board will enable enhanced social distancing while underway,” he added.

In addition to social distancing, Sailors aboard will execute Navy COVID-19 prevention and mitigation policies, including all required lessons learned from a safety stand down last week and a simulated underway earlier this week.

During the simulated underway, known as a “fast cruise,” the crew walked through routine and emergency procedures while executing COVID-19 mitigation measures, including wearing masks, medical surveillance of 100% of the crew, adjusted meal hours, minimizing in-person meetings, sanitizing spaces and a simulated medical evacuation.

“It feels great to be back at sea,” said Rear Adm. Stu Baker, commander of Carrier Strike Group 9.

“Getting Theodore Roosevelt and Carrier Air Wing 11 one step closer to returning to their mission in the Indo-Pacific is a great achievement for the crew,” Baker said.