Posted on 07/13/2020 2:26:03 PM PDT by NRx
More than 400 sailors are working to put out the massive fire that continues to rage aboard the USS Bonhomme Richard in San Diego and Navy officials are unclear how long the blaze might continue to burn.
The fire has brought down the amphibious assault ship's forward mast and caused other damage to the ship's superstructure that rises above its flight deck.
"There is a tremendous amount of heat underneath and that's where it's -- it's flashing up -- also forward, closer to the bow again there's a heat source and we're trying to get to that as well," Rear Adm. Philip Sobeck, the commander of Expeditionary Strike Group 3 said at a news conference Monday in San Diego.
More than 400 sailors are working to put out the massive fire that continues to rage aboard the USS Bonhomme Richard in San Diego and Navy officials are unclear how long the blaze might continue to burn.
The fire has brought down the amphibious assault ship's forward mast and caused other damage to the ship's superstructure that rises above its flight deck.
"There is a tremendous amount of heat underneath and that's where it's -- it's flashing up -- also forward, closer to the bow again there's a heat source and we're trying to get to that as well," Rear Adm. Philip Sobeck, the commander of Expeditionary Strike Group 3 said at a news conference Monday in San Diego.
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
If there is a danger of the fire reaching the fuel tanks, they should scuttle the ship. Sink her at the pier. Because the water is so shallow there that would likely only flood the lower decks. But that would put a wall of water between the fire and the fuel.
I don't know; it sounds like they had something on board that was expensive.
Having been in the navy I can tell you the water level under that ship is a few feet. They know where each ship can dock. I don’t think sinking it would do more than drop it a few feet.
Don’t think they want to totally sink it; maybe up over the decks or a bit higher. Then there’s the raising to do after if it’s worth it. Any news on how it started?
So’s magnesium...
The Rooskies don’t have anything on us by god. we can burn a ship to the waterline with the best of the third world navies.
Good points...And it may come to a point where the amount of water required to buffer the fuel tanks from the fire will create stability concerns including sinking or possibly capsizing.
And how many years?
I agree, I was on the Blueback. It’s to ever see a ship/boat go down.
Magnesium burns like hell fire
Wild guess but possibly used dirty old solvent/painting rags put in a can or maybe a box or a pile on the ground. Reading that the ship is under repairs.
At this point, they should flood it and let it settle.
The Normandie's architect suggested the same thing but was overruled.
A ship/boat in port is always under repair/maintenance until underway again.
The USS Oklahoma capsized, was righted and refloated but sank under tow to the west coast. The USS West Virginia was counter flooded to sink sitting up right.
The USS Franklin was repaired in NewYork and sent to mothball in 1947. She was never modernized like most of the other Essex class carriers in the 1950’s. She was scrapped in 1966.
I haven't read the whole thread yet, so I'm sorry if this has been responded to, but as a native local and the bay being my old stomping grounds that the deepest part of the bay is the channel. Where the burning ship is is right outside of the channel. The channel is right outside of the containment booms you see floating out in front of the bow. The channel runs parallel to the coast at that point, and would probably be (without breaking out my charts) the only part of the bay that would come close to being able to swallow a ship like that. That would block all large traffic to the southern part of the bay.
Wonder if the captain will be held responsible.
Let’s assume his career is over whether he was there or not.
If a ship is in for repairs don’t they have the captain do shore duty?
I have heard nothing about that other than it was a refit for the F35, so my assumption would be the planes were not there. Looking at the pics of the deck you dont see any. I know when my boy was at sea, the planes did not leave the port with the ship ... they flew on later. My guess is they are parked at the NAS.
About 1.8 million gallons of F-76 distillate fuel and 400,000+ gallons of JP-5 aviation turbine fuel at full load. That fuel is going to burn until they get it out.
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