Wouldn't it seem more likely that the destroyer cut across the cargo ship's path?
If that were the case the cargo ship would have cut her in half and sunk her
They dont have the ability to stop and it takes them 20 minutes to even start to slow down- thats about 7 miles of travel distance
The damage looks like the cargo ship was going dead slow, contacted the destroyer after an approach abaft starboard, and may already have been turning away
Wth the captain wasnt on the bridge when a possible collision was unfolding - is a mystery
If there was some clandestine intership transfer he would surely have been there
A DDG is like a Ferrari. A cargo ship is like a stake truck from the early 90s.
The DDG was struck on the right side of the ship. The DDG is the GIVE WAY vessel. The cargo ship’s job was to maintain course and speed. The DDG was supposed to avoid the commercial traffic.
Unless . . .
The one reason I can see the DDG wanting to maintain station would be to recover SPECWAR guys for some reason that a Sub wasn’t available to do that, but they were too far from shore for that, and the CO was in his rack, and that would not be the case if that were true.
No, the junior officer OOD likely killed seven of his shipmates and got his CO court martialed.