
I see a plotline for NCIS coming up...
Labcoat for Abby
The US Navy's newest and mightiest nuclear aircraft carrier, the USS George H W Bush*, has been plagued by continual failures in its lavatories, according to reports. Sailors have been forced into increasingly desperate measures to relieve themselves. Nov 11, 2011: USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77) transits the Arabian Gulf in …
What I don't get is the deliberate introduction of single points of failure on a fucking warship.
Banks of bogs serviced by centralised vacuum systems? That is a guaranteed disaster, no matter how massively over engineered.
Vacuum should always be generated as close to the point of need as possible.
Maintenance of the CHT (collection, holding, and trasnfer - i.e. sewage) lines and system traditionally belong to the Damage Control Division, headed up by the Damage Control Assistant (DCA). The lines require more-or-less constant attention in rotation - start at one end of the hull and work to the other, then start all over. I've seen what happens when the process isn't followed correctly, and it's *NASTY.* It's the job of the DCA make sure his sailors know what they're doing, and actually do the job right, as well.
Fire his butt.
When you read this line:
"Naval commanders blamed the problems on inappropriate objects such as clothes or feminine hygiene products being flushed down the heads."
FFS. If such an excuse is believable (and I'm dubious), then the seamen and seawomen should be told over and OVER again that flushing clothes and tampons is not the thing to do. It's bloody common sense, but since most people lack common sense, they need to be told - preferably by angry chief petty officers shouting in their face. Or maybe they should have sanitary bins next to the female toilets, like they do in civvie world.
Myself, I'm suspecting the episode is the fault of the US Military-Industrial complex. Some company's been given a no-bid contract to provide the toilets to the George Bush because the firm's CEO play golf with a couple of Senators, and there's no clause that prevents the company getting their money just because the loos aren't up to scratch.
"FFS. If such an excuse is believable (and I'm dubious),
then the seamen and seawomen should be told over and OVER again
that flushing clothes and tampons is not the thing to do."
Vessel deployment imminent.
Reluctant to depart swabbie, rinses & releases t-shirt.
Line blockage or macerator damage.
Deployment delayed.
Repeat as required.
Regular occurence in UK RN.
Carrier design is a mature technology, so I strongly doubt some "no bid contract" deliberately made this mistake. The Nimitiz Class (including the Bush, named after the senior Bush, a carrier aviator in WWII) are built by Northrop Grumman, a regular contractor for multiple ships, and one of the few capable of building something of this magnitude.
Since the design is of a proven historical status, I concur with a prior poster that the Damage Control Officer is likely not managing his department and taskings properly.
Before ranting about a subject, a few minutes of google would at least give you a starting point to not being foolish.
Fire the Training Officer?
Ah, no.
"Not tossing inappropriate items down the shitter" is something that is taught young sailors LONG before they ever see anything that floats. Maintenance of that 'Basic' instruction does not belong to the Training Officer (technically, that's the XO, though the job is delgated far down teh chain and to many individuls) but rather to the various Chiefs and Leading Petty Officers whom are responsible for discipline and management of their sailors.
So, yeah, there's apparently a discipline problem on board, too. But mostly, I'd blame the Damage Control Division - If you do the job right, the lines stay reasonably clear no matter *what* goes down them, and if you do it wrong, even once, you can (literally) stuff up the whole system for days. Or even better, if it's an older vessel, you can cause a CHT line to rupture - under pressure.
I've seen the results that last item. Nasty beyond the power of words to relate.
423 dunnies for 5,000 people? That about 1 for every 12 crew, or 2 hours per day each. Even if they are reserved for different genders and ranks (mustn't see the officers with their trousers down!) that's still a great deal of porcelain.
One can only assume that the designers needed that amount of redundancy in the system to cope for "emergencies" (aircraft-carrier landings can be scary events) and the reported breakdowns. I wonder if the weapons systems, for all their extra complexity, are any more reliable?
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they stuck their backsides over the poop deck and got on with it, there was no 3 ply toilet roll, they ate weevil infested biscuits, rotting salt beef, got scurvy, drank grog, climbed the rigging without a health and safety assessment, fought at every opportunity. They were real men.
Not like the namby-pamby lot of today who need their pepsi, aircon, risk assess having a shave and eat peaches and cream for afters.
So, letting women on warships has proven to be a bad idea? Didn't the ancients know that already?
Since the sewage system is vacuum operated, the obvious problem is a lack of air pressure to push the sewage through the lines. So, I wonder who the contract to increase the Earth's air pressure will be given to (and, how much it'll cost)?
Porcelain toilets? I thought they were all still stainless steel. After all, porcelain can shatter when an explosion goes off (Err, I'm talking ordnance; get your minds out of the gutter! Then, again, some of those navy bean fueled meals might be hazardous, too!), while stainless steel won't shatter. And, would you really want to be sitting on an object which can shatter and throw sharp shards into your nether regions if Al Queda happens to set off a firecracker beside the ship?
Not me.
P.S. I'll get my coat. It's the one with the waterproof pockets.
because they would use conventional aircraft and not f35 jumpjets that we get +1000 brown nose points from the americans (were these not mostly planned through tony blairs bush rimming era?) who need as many international suckers sorry partners to prop up the hyper expensive mission creeping program.
As I recall the Invincible didn't have sucking heads on it (apart from beer time), but it did have twin gravity-fed sewage treatment plants down in the "bowels" of the ship. The CEO's party piece was drinking the waste water at the end of the purification process. Much clearer than the icon to the left.
Mostly things worked just fine, although I do recall one of the plants breaking down on one occasion.
This being an IT based site and most of us working in IT we can of course bang on about single points of failure but you should remember this is on a ship where space is limited and the kit to support the function isn't exactly small I bet.
Remember it is a ship of war and is already the size oif a small island, any bigger and it would give the enemy even easier target practice.