The Rush to Non-Judgement

When a Navy ship runs aground, the Captain is usually considered guilty until proven innocent

The HMNZS Manawanui aground and on fire on the reef opposite Siumu Village

I suspect I read the story of the disaster in Samoa with the sinking of the New Zealand Naval vessel, HMNZS Manawanui with a different perspective than most. I was in the US Navy for 13 years as a medical officer and one of those years was spent on a US Naval vessel, The USS Wabash, AOR-13, including an 8-month deployment to the Western Pacific. I learned much about the Navy as a result of that year.

Navy officer ranks are different than that of any other service. The order of rank, from lowest to highest is: ensign, lieutenant junior grade, lieutenant, lieutenant commander, commander, captain, and admiral. Despite their actual rank, any officer who commands a Navy ship, is addressed as “Captain.” In the case of the Manawanui, the captain was Yvonne Gray, who held the rank of commander.

My year at sea impressed on me the unique position occupied by the captain of a Naval vessel, whatever their actual rank. They have the ultimate responsibility and authority for all that goes on aboard their ship. An order from the captain has the force of law. There is a word that describes disobeying a lawful order from a ship’s captain: mutiny, traditionally punishable by death.

A captain cannot be physically present on the bridge of a vessel 24/7. If nothing else, they have to sleep. Even though they delegate duties to their officers and crew, they are still ultimately responsible. The buck stops with them.

Grounding of a ship, Naval or commercial, is a very serious matter. It usually requires that the ship go into drydock for a thorough inspection for both obvious and occult damage. Grounding a ship at sea can, and usually does, wreck, a Naval officer’s career. If the grounding leads to the ship being lost, the potential damage to an officer’s career escalates exponentially. If found culpable, it is safe to say that their career is over. If there is any negligence or incompetence, criminal charges and courts martial may follow, which could lead to prison or discharge from the service.

This incident was unprecedented with no New Zealand Naval vessel lost since WWII. The Manawanui was specifically built for hygrographic surveys and was conducting a routine mapping of the ocean floor off the Island of Upolu, one of the Samoan Islands. The cause of the grounding is unknown, and a Naval court of inquiry has been convened. This would be routine.

What was not routine was some of the early messaging about the incident. Commander Gray is both a woman and a lesbian. Neither has any bearing on her qualifications, which one would assume were sufficient for her to be given command of one of only nine active vessels in the New Zealand Navy. What was unusual was that even before any inquiry had been done Commander Gray was being praised.

Chief of Navy, Rear Admiral Garin Golding, said she made the "right decision" to evacuate the 75 people aboard, which "saved lives". She determined the ship was lost, but was it? The loss of this ship was a huge blow to the New Zealand navy which can barely man its tiny fleet. Absent a proper investigation, such a declaration seems premature. Defense Minister Judith Collins called the evacuation "something of a triumph, frankly", given the difficult conditions. The tortured effort to put a positive spin on this disaster calls to mind the satirical line, “Besides that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?” More recently, there was Biden calling the debacle of our Afghanistan withdrawawl an “extraordinary success.”

The loss of the ship is huge for New Zealand, which is struggling to man its tiny fleet of nine ships. This is not nearly enough for New Zealand’s defense needs and to patrol its territorial waters. On top of this, the sinking is an evolving ecological disaster since the ship carried over 950 tons of diesel fuel.

I cannot help but wonder what the early response would have been had the commanding officer of the Manawanui had been an “old, straight, white male.” During my year at sea, I observed two such incidents. One was a grounding and the other striking a bridge while a pilot was aboard and directing my ship up a river. Pilots are specialists who know a harbor, river, or other body of water intimately and are taken aboard to guide a ship in tricky waters. Even when a pilot is aboard, however, the ship’s captain is still ultimately responsible. In both cases, the captain was an OSWM. The official response was silence, not praise, until the inquiry was complete.  

Richard T. Bosshardt, MD, FACS, Senior Fellow at Do No Harm, Founding Fellow of FAIR in Medicine

The Making of a Plastic Surgeon: Two Years in the Crucible Learning the Art and Science is my attempt to present a unique glimpse into the fascinating and misunderstood world of plastic surgery and what it takes to become one. It is available in eBook and paperback on Amazon.