Those folks were awakened by this ramming whether intentional or not. They didn’t know. I assume they followed procedure that is drilled into them. This article speculates that the men were alive. Maybe they were. Maybe they were injured upon impact. We don’t know. It is a terrible tragedy.
I was looking at the ship’s Facebook page and noticed that the ship had been involved in some joint Navy exercises a week ago. I haven’t had a chance to ask my Navy family members anything about this, but I was wondering how fatigued a crew might be after intense training. It is so baffling that the crew did not awaken the captain. That means they were unaware that there was anything near them.
I’ve been to REFTRA at GITMO many times. Almost all WTD can be un-dogged and opened from either side. The side with the hinges presents a problem. If the water has risen above the lower threshold hydrostatic pressure will make the door un- openable even if un-dogged. So there are two possibilities: The dead sailors were killed on impact. They weren’t killed but injured so baldy a they couldn’t crawl out before the door was secured. If they were banging on the door to get out that noise would have been heard by other crew members. I did not hear that there was any indication of noise form that comparment.
Or, considering the type of ship they were on, simply didn't follow SOP. The watchstanders didn't do their jobs.
This was where my thoughts ended up. I was a Surface Warfare qualified officer and spent a lot of time as OOD underway on small boys in that area.
Every ship I ever served on has a notebook on the bridge called the Captain's Night Order book. He writes it out longhand every night even though most of it is repetitive. Every oncoming OOD and JOOD reads it before assuming the watch. One of the sections contains conditions when the CO is to be awakened and informed. A common one if if the wind shifts more than 45 degrees. One of those conditions is always there and concerns a vessel with a CPA (Closest Point of Approach) of 1000 yards or less.
It pains me to say this but the fact that the captain was asleep when his ship was hit leads me to suspect that the ultimate cause of this horrible accident was negligent watch standing. In this type of collision at night it almost always is.