Asleep at the wheel

A U.S. Navy probe that blamed the USS Hartford for a collision with a Navy surface ship last March and found submarine crew members were at times literally asleep at the wheel, should be a wake-up call to the silent service.

Some might argue that the grounding of that same submarine off Italy in 2003, due in part to navigation errors, should also have been a wake-up call.

The Hartford is not the only U.S. submarine to have had more than one accident. In February 2001 the USS Greenville surfaced under a Japanese research vessel, killing nine people. Six months later it ran aground off Saipan and five months after that it collided with a Navy surface vessel off the coast of Oman.

Since the research vessel disaster there have been a half-dozen other submarine accidents, and each time the Navy has relieved a skipper of command and promised to take corrective steps.

Following the most recent Hartford accident, the commander of the Submarine Force ordered a review of submarine collisions since 2001 to determine what can be learned. It's too early to say if the collisions show evidence of a systemic performance problem, but even one accident involving a billion-dollar vessel and the lives of hundreds of sailors is too many.

One thing is certain: The report of the Hartford's most recent mishap, when it struck a Navy amphibious ship, the USS New Orleans, reveals shockingly lax command.

Most damning was that the collision took place in the Strait of Hormuz, arguably the world's most strategic waterway crisscrossed by oil tankers from the Persian Gulf and military vessels from hostile nations.

Details of the report, published in The Day Wednesday, found crew members chatted while working; those driving the ship often had one hand on the controls and sometimes took their shoes off; crew members added stereo speakers to the radio room to listen to music; five sailors had reputations as "sleepers" who would routinely nod off on watch.

How could this have happened, in light of past accidents and past promises of corrective action? An explanation by the Navy is called for.