USS Connecticut Final Investigation Report 

So massive command failures at nearly all levels, but the sailors manning their stations saved the day despite the lack of command leadership.... that says a lot for the young sailors and non-comm's involved.

I spent 20 years in the submarine force as a Sonar Technician. My first major deployment was a Western Pacific (WestPac) 7-month long cruise. One of the ports we stopped at was in Guam. For people unfamiliar with this location, Guam is literally the top of a mountain. I was assigned to the fathometer (depth to keel sounder) during the maneuvering watch. Pretty sure the Sonar Chief did this on purpose. So we're coming in and the soundings are at maximum scale. Then within seconds, we go from deep ocean to shallow (red soundings) faster than I could change the range scale and I'm pretty sure the pitch of my voice rose just as quickly. Of course this sudden change in bottom reflected the steep incline of the mountain and it was totally expected by the more experienced members of the Navigation party, but it definitely made an impact on myself. The Navigation drill involving red & yellow soundings brought back all of the sheer terror that I remembered!!

I was surface warfare during my 20 years as a QM. During a small snapshot of time in the early 2000's our FTG in San Diego evaluated my nav team as insufficiently trained. I addressed everything FTG listed in their final evaluation and re-evaluation was scheduled for 3 months later during our work ups for deployment. 3 months later, again, my team was given low scores even though we passed every single navigation and ship handling exercise. The navigator appealed the evaluation. It was found that the evaluator had less experience than my entire nav team and he was replaced. We received a passing evaluation a short time later before deployment. Sometimes its just political.

I’m a former sub qualified officer. It’s been many years since I served, but this summary provides some insight as to why people were relieved of their duties. One thing that wasn’t mentioned (I assume because it’s not in the report) was when was the last time they had a navigational fix. It would be interesting to know. If they were traveling at those speeds I assume they were transiting and not doing a specific operation. If so the two OOD’s involved weren’t doing their jobs, nor was the navigator and the QM. At the very least when the watch section switched over the oncoming OOD should be verifying the ships position and identifying possible hazards. It sounds like everyone was in a relaxed “business as usual “ transiting mindset.

22 year retired submariner TMC/SS. I have just one word listening to your report and the arrogance of this crew. INEVITABLE! COMSUBPAC should’ve been relieved as well!

"More counseling sheets than a seaman after a liberty call." I loled very, very hard at that. Well done, sir. :heart:

Having the Fathometer in deep mode while being shallow is roughly the equivalent of using a Geiger counter to test the radiation of a spent nuclear fuel rod. To those who do not know what I mean by that, it is that the amount of radiation produced by the rod is so ridiculously high that it causes the Geiger to essentially have a seizure which causes it to not give a reading at all, giving the false perception that there is no radiation at all. The same thing happens with a Fathometer, that is expecting a fairly weak signal from deep water, suddenly being blasted by high energy soundwaves coming up from a bottom directly below it. The fathometer was getting such a strong return, that in the deep-water mode, it was being oversaturated by return signals to the point where it could not give any reading at all.

I worked for General Dynamics in the late 80's to early 90's and was part of the SSN-21 class design team. Those guys did a great job saving that ship. We only have a total of 3 SeaWolf class ships out there. These 3 ships are among the best Subs with extraordinary equipment and capabilities. We can not afford to lose a SeaWolf class ship!

Holy smokes those guys must have been shitting bricks when they flipped the chicken switches and kept sinking out. Can't even imagine that feeling of dread.

**Walks into the surf and bangs toe on a rock** Damn you, you unexposed bathymetric feature!

This same thing happened to the Seawolf (SSN575) back in the late 60's when I was new on board. The similarities are amazing. I can still remember the emergency blow and the horrendous up angle. We damaged the bow and the stern. The part I had a chuckle about was that "7 Sailors were recommended for mental health treatment". Back then I guess we were just expected to "suck it up"! Anyway, I am so glad she made it back and those guys did a wonderful job saving their boat!

I'm on a sub out here in Guam, and seeing the damage to the bow with my own eyes when they pulled in next to us really gave me a different view on just how crazy our job is as submariners!

Although not Military, I've worked in Corporates - and when there is an issue that gets escalated up the chain and then suddenly the issue is a non-issue: Either someone is sleeping with someone or that issue is the door that is hiding a skeleton.

The Engineering crew really was on their toes. This navigational error could have easily become an imploded sub had Engineering not been able to recover.

I’m a 69yo disabled USAF veteran and have only been on a USN Submarine once in Pearl Harbor. My friend Manny Irwin brought me aboard to show me around. Very impressive. We spent about an hour in the sub and I was in awe the whole time. How you men do this is an amazing feat. Thank You for protecting America.

As a former QM both sub and surface red and yellow soundings were drilled into our heads as well as procedures. I was Chart PO on paper charts and every day I was updating the charts and adding and updating them. I can not imagine going 24 knots blind with no situational awareness. I hope this has taken care of the attitudes so it never happens again. We are way past statistical probabilities of losing a boat since 1968 we have had several collisions and almost lost at least 4 boats I know if including mine while on it. I have PTSD from our almost catastrophic event but there was not such thing as psyc help for it in the 90’s.

16:30 The crew not performing immediate actions during drills... Holy crap. That'd be like ORSE showing up and the drill team simulating a dropped control rod and the Reactor Operator just ignoring it. Sheesh. I would imagine that the RO would be relieved on the spot!

Standing watch on the fathometer was stressful in shallow water, especially when the returns became erratic. Always felt a severe sense of dread in those situations as I adjusted knobs to dial it back in even if the QM’s chart showed we were in navigable water.

I'll never forget when my boat got an LOI and the CO took it out on us back in the Engine room. Friend of mine killed himself due to depression from being degraded so badly. Definetly didn't want to reenlist after that and I never forgave the CO or the base commander who personally came down to our boat and attacked our character.

I'm not Navy or military, but the lessons learned here can be applied to many kinds of teams with similar command structures. Thanks for this vid.

as nothing more than an old landlubber I thought to myself wow they hung these guys out to dry for striking an uncharted undersea obstacle. Now I know why. Nothing is as simple as it first appears, especially with systems as complex as an SSN. thanks for a fascinating update.

Thank you for doing this. As a person who has never served in the military forces it is an outstanding insight into the hows and whys of the way things are done. There are many lessons that are applicable outside of the military context. For example, your discussion of the need for "formal" language was very interesting to me as I run a cyber-security team which can also suffer from degradation of communication when the adrenalin is pumping, in the middle of a cyber breach event.

A friend of mine had a brother working on this sub, and he won't talk about what happened. I guess now I understand why. Thank you for making this easily available and understandable

We had an XO that spent his time during ship yards scalp hunting destroying enlisted and lower rank officers enlistments and planned careers to try to get command of the boat after the yards on the blue crew. We had an nuke engineer that had just made chief that received so much crap from said XO that he walked out the front gate of the ship yard and bought a bag of pot and walked back to the crew barge and turned himself in just to get himself transferred off the boat. I found out back during the 2000 to 2010 period that the reason the sub was decommed because the sub was run aground coming out the firth of Clyde. They found the damage so bad the command crew was relieved and another command team was assigned to return the boat to New London. Yes there has been crappy officers that CYA and scalp hunt to further their career to get to the Pentagon to get into the perfumed princes cliché to get their flag. You are correct we are damned lucky we did not lose the boat and crew it was totally the enlisted and lower rank officers that saved the day my congrats to the crew that saved the CT.

Wow, this was so much more serious. I thought they had just smashed up their expensive sonar. Instead they almost got themselves killed. They managed to ram enough gravel into the ballast tank to be negatively buoyant even after an emergency blow... plus the temporary loss of propulsion, broken trim system that they managed to fix only for the pump to catch on fire... oh my.

You have to ask why the CO wasn't removed well before this could happen. Both COMSUBPAC and the task force commander need to be investigated for there role in this.

For civilians who have always regarded the submarine service in a romantic and adventurous light thanks to films and books, you bring an awareness that it requires a team of highly trained, hard working people in difficult conditions to be successful. Thanks for your insights.

Being Quartermaster 50 years ago on a NUC, this all sounds crazy. We used charts, some hand drawn from far away places with limited soundings. DR plots were sometimes better than LORAN, no GPS back then. The Fathometer was never used while on deployment. Maybe now there is something less noisy, we only listened. I did use the Fathometer transiting the east coast and it was fun to watch the depths change as we we went over a canyon. The chain of command was very relaxed. I rarely saw the Navigation officer except on maneuvering watch or to wake him up for a major course change. The OOD was a rated chief and had no control other than watching the planesmen and trimming the boat. While on the surface the OOD, on the bridge, relied on the QM to tell him where to go and change coarse, he had no other means except visual. So, approaching a pier, usually with tug help, should be pretty routine, things can go wrong. As with us, no tug showed up once. We have to dock. Slowly approaching the pier, closer and closer, remember tho OOD on the bridge has no control of the boat. Barking commands, he does his best…bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. Seven pilings split and a three foot dent on the bow. Before I reported on board, We bounced off a sea mount and wrangled up the forward blast tank grate. I could go on and on.

Interesting. The Toledo is the ship from the Smarter Every Day series.

That the CO dismissed the safety officer report is telling of itself.

I served with the SSN 22 COB when he was a first class. One of the very few first classes on the boat that was qualified dive. He was incredibly smart and a great leader. I hope he makes it back.

I’m a marine who did two deployments on the 31st MEU on the BHR (ship that burned down). This is fascinating bc I really don’t know a lot about how the navy operates. I was an 0311 so I’m good at eating crayons. The more I learn the more the navy impresses me and I’m grateful for how y’all treated us on ship!

An interesting discussion would be whether the process and stadards of the nav team and watch officers was so bad because of lower standards held by the CO, or if the CO,XO had created an environment where the crew was reluctant to speak up about the (seemingly) minor stuff. I don't know the standards required by the QM, but if his job says report ANY failing of the ONE fathometer they are using, why would he not do so, except for failing level of standard or bad environment for reporting. Sickening stuff. Almost lost a crew, and a boat, to incompetence that could have been avoided.

Glad to see the Command did get some UCMJustice. My 2 COs were awesome and my old XO became the first CO on the USS Virginia. Mr Kern I believe. He hated us Agangers because early in his career as a junior officer, he was climbing out of his boat and accidentally tripped the Hatch latch as he grabbed the handle to exit. That water tight Hatch just happened to be in the middle of having the counter balance springs replaced. So instead of having the 800lb 3" HY80 Steel Hatch slowly start to close as he hit the hold-open latch, it just just fell closed with his head inbetween and literally broke his head in half at the nose level. From what I was told, he was in the hospital for over a year or so, but he recovered and came back to the sub service. So when he was our XO, he would come by and do pop quiz's anytime he saw Auxillary Division doing maintenance or PMS. So I learned quick to always have every tool, ppe, and correct in-date lubricants called out in the maintenance procedure as on-the-spot inspections were the norm. I can probably give that man 75% of the credit for our boats "Battle E" due to his involvement with the crew. He was harsh, but he made us better men in the end. Great Men: Commander Kern and my mentor COB, Master Chief Gooch!

"You better start making plans for the next life, because you're almost done with this one" The way you said this made me chuckle.

Awesome work, thanks for this. I was precom crew on the USS Connecticut before I got out in 1998 and I have been eagerly awaiting this report. As always your coverage and insights have been spot on.

Great job on this video, mate. I hadn't realized how close we came to losing this sub.

Fascinating but - even allowing for the redactions in the report - the story is incomplete. 1. Why was the boat not recalled immediately to Guam once the failings during the mid-deployment inspection came to light? 2. What the hell was the boat doing flogging around at just shy of 20 knots in the South China Sea? It's dangerous enough there for surface ships, let alone submarines and, being in China's back yard, is very likely to be full of Chinese underwater sensors. 3. What happened to the Commander of Submarine Development Squadron 5? He had flagged this boat as below standard (dangerous, even) all the way through. 4. Why did the Squadron Commander then withdraw his criticisms, following his conversation with COMSUBPAC? 5. Was his departure REALLY a routine, planned succession of command? 5. Finally, what happened to COMSUBPAC? Surely, his judgement had to have been questioned in endorsing the boat as fit for operations. Did he get off Scot free because he was the one who convened the board of enquiry.

Former ETR2. This is absolutely terrifying. It's like I used to tell my nubs, complacency kills.

"We hit a bathymetric feature" You mean a rock? "Yes"

I have a feeling the real root cause of this incident will not be addressed until there are significant changes farther up the command structure - perhaps all the way up.

This is actually frightening given that it's a irreplaceable $3 Billion submarine AND CREW!

I was stationed on the USS Wasp LHD-1 when we ran aground off the coast of Somalia in '93 doing gator squares. I remember the ship shuddering when I was in my rack, and I thought we were doing speed trials. Thankfully, it was only the screw that impacted the bottom. They relieved our captain (who was in his quarters at the time), navigator, and a couple of others. Other than that (which I heard was the enlisted navigator's fault), he was a great captain. He was the same captain whose ship hit a magnetic mine in the Persian Gulf that tore open the starboard bow. His leadership helped save that ship.

I appreciate you fairly judged the entire picture and especially recognized the crew who did the right things to save the ship and prevent the problems from being far worse. Great work.

When we did the SSN 23 conversion we added a deep submergence object avoidance sonar (DSOAS) which hopefully prevents this type of mishap. However if memory serves, it's operation is limited to lower ship speeds. Also, wouldn't a faulty trim pump have been a CAT 3 CASRP? TYCOM wouldn't normally release a ship for unrestricted ops with this problem.

Wow, this is just terrible. I am so glad I served on my boat when I did. Any crew that we were part of could've ended up like this crew, but thank God it didn't. I really hope the crew of CONNECTICUT turns it around whenever the boat gets out of drydock. I highly recommend they all read Capt. L. David Marquet's books, they're going to need them.

I’ve seen several of the “After Action Report” videos and this one, by far, has set the standard. BRAVO ZULU!!!

I'm a former DWO & navigator on a USCG buoy tender home-ported on Guam. I kept cringing and muttering "Oh, you guys are screwed" and "Damn, that was lucky" as I watched this. USS CONNECTICUT almost became the next USS THRESHER. Yikes.

Very informative report, thank you for presenting it in an interesting way. Basically shows that no single f' up can cause something like this, but only many, systemic issues combined.

I'm not even tangentially related to naval stuff, and yet I can fully understand Aaron's pieces. Keep up the brilliant work!

Excellent video. I was a QM on the USS Chicago in the late 80s to early 90s. I had 18 years of sea time in 22 years of service. I can't imagine having a chain of command that functioned like this. Although, we did have a CO that thought he walked on water near the end of my tour there. I think you nailed the hubris comment spot on.

This is an excellent summary and presentation of a very dramatic and entirely preventable occurrence. It should be mandatory viewing for anyone working in safety critical environments, whether it is on land, at sea or in the air. Thank you for taking the time to create and share this content.

@38:46: This part reminds me of something an instructor once told me. A lot of people expect Murphy's law, but sailors are better of served by O'Toole's commentary on Murphy's Law which goes, "Murphy was a [REDACTED] optimist. After all, things tend to go from bad to worse."

Great video. Very well presentend and super interesting. It reminds me of many videos from the Mentour Pilot channel where air accidents are explained. And here as well as in his channel you can clearly see how one failure leads to more and more and what a cascade of such failures can cause. Thank you for this informative video.

First time here. This report earned a like and subscribe. I grew up reading USNI proceedings and this is hits a similar combination of insight and clarity. Top notch.

Im a BMC in the Navy and this breakdown was awesome (painful to see the failures). Well done Sir.

I can't even imagine how terrifying that must have been for the crew. I guess if the boat has negative buoyancy and the emergency blow fails, without propulsion the next step is to pray that the bottom is shallower than crush depth. Outstanding reporting as usual!

Thanks once again SUB BRIEF for this latest update concerning the USS Connecticut underwater incident in the South China Sea. Being a former submariner yourself only adds to the excitement and joy that l experience while watching your many videos.Please keep up the good work sir. Guess Lady Luck was present that almost fateful day. God bless you sir....from a fan here in the Fiji Islands down the South Pacific.

My father served on one of the last diesel boats and why I was born in Key West in the early 60s. He is 100% boats and I pursued a career in aviation. I can relate to the wording used as being overly technical. The control input operator made contact with a elevated terrain feature leading to a destructive aircraft dismantling. Meaning. The pilot flew into a mountain.

Another outstanding and detailed debriefing… You really are setting a gold standard… I stumbled across your channel during the ill fated titanic carbon fiber, submersible debacle… Been coming back ever since

I was on the 22 from 2013-2018. Out of drydock, there was much to learn on everyone's part with most sailors with zero seawolf class experience. There was definitely an atmosphere of arrogance as we began to learn and excel. Our triad was smart and confident, and though arrogance arose, we never got too ahead of ourselves. My friends who stayed on after I departed would always complain about how the new guys didn't want to work hard or try. Maybe generational, but large in part caused by the SDS5 attitude towards maintaining the 21 and 22 at sea as much as possible. From the top down, this all falls on accepting subpar day to day operations, training, and military standards. If we continue to allow softness, our navy will surely continue down this path of egregious error. Sad to know my beloved ship is potentially a parts boat becuase of ignorance. Thank you for this review.

Just amazes me such a dis-functional crew is assigned to one of the best submarines in the world. Really shows how pressed the navy is to actually man what they have I guess. At least though it shows how much the drill training paid off. These men, especially those standing, slammed into whatever was directly fore of them at dangerous velocities with no warning, as the boat encountered massive deceleration from an immovable object. And that they were able to get their senses enough to do everything they did to save the boat was impressive.

Incredibly interesting to listen to and a lot of lessons to be learned for anyone in any profession. Thank you for putting this together for us

You have done a great job reviewing and explaining this report . The members of the crew who in whole or in part caused this incident should be court martialed and seperated from the service . While their motivation to serve is not in question , the possible death of an entire crew cannot be overlooked .

Imagine being a crewmember and having your life in the hands of these meatballs 😳

As a Ex MM3\SS this fricken Nav crew is unbelievable. I would be ripping into and throttling these enept kids running that boat. Not reporting Loss of Sounding? They are lucky to be alive. And they are a Special Ops boat! That whole Command needs to be fired and unqualified.

Epic video, thank you. What an extraordinary demonstration of incompetence! Reminds me of British comic military dramas like "Dad's Army", except that this was a real boat and it nearly sank.

Fantastic work Aaron! I tried reading some various reports, from news outlets, but you absolutely crushed this. Glad I’m a subscribers!

Thank you. As an old boat sailor I pretty much filled in the blanks, although that trim system failure is a puzzler. The temporary loss of propulsion was a frightening aspect. I recall the "recovery curves" and how important maintenance of propulsion is to coming out alive (those curves got drilled in as part of qualifying on throttles). Your comments about some people feeling that they are "special" by virtue of being assigned are spot-on. There are those who think themselves "chosen ones" and then there were those who recognize that they have a lot of learning to do if they are going to meet expectations. The former are dangerous. It's the difference between arrogant and humble. Like you, I would love to know what transpired in that magical "Zoom Call" that led to the assessment reversal. It seems to me that the people who orchestrated that change of heart should be under review as well. Their political concerns overrode their readiness mandate. This seems to be a case of SRDH. The cooking oil fiasco raises concerns about stowing for sea. Didn't they do angles and dangles? Did they allow stowage to degrade over time as some stores were pulled for use? Rocks in 1A and 1B. That explains the initial buoyancy problem after EBT blow. Remember the pictures of the bow of the USS San Francisco (2005)? I have not found any Connecticut damage pictures. (The Atlanta had a similar run in with mother earth as well. That happened near Gibraltar.) Forward fathometer failure. Trim pump problem (known, then caught fire). Weird trim system malfunction. This is a pretty new boat. What is going on with its material condition? Own ships noise reflected back to them. They are at 24 knots and they hear this? I thought this class was supposed to be quiet?! Perhaps it says good things for their passive sonar... it could hear this despite flow noise. Sort of a good news / bad news situation.

Great Video, thanks Jive! Quick release as well, nicely done!

Great breakdown of the whole situation. Gives some real insight into what lead to the casualty. Crazy to see this happening in this day and age on a Seawolf. Fantastic video, Capt. Jive!

Great report on the incident, thanks for your insight, experience and of course, your service.

stopped what I was doing to watch this! Thank you Aaron!

It's mind boggling to think that no one thought it wasn't important to know how deep you are, it's like driving down the highway with your eyes closed.I can see how disturbed you are about this and thank you for this video.

Fantastic video. Not only does it feed my curiosity, but some of the lessons are useful in line of work.

Wow wow wow! Thank for this awesome report! I absolutely loved and appreciated it sir.

Wow it sounds like the crew as a whole did a damned fine job *after* the grounding, but holy hell that Nav team...

Addicted to your videos. Retired Air Force pilot, airline pilot, really enjoy your videos and commentary. Not a bad one in the lot.

I had never heard of your channel when it popped up on my recommended list. Great Job. I subscribed & liked. Happy Trails from Florida

There was never any doubt the CO, XO, NAV and OOD were going to be relieved at a minimum. I served aboard the USS Permit (SSN 594) and we had an “incident” on my 2nd underway that afforded us a lovely 30+ day vacation in Adak, AK. We had a new CO, XO and Eng (he was the OOD) on our next underway several months later. Somehow our NAV didn’t get the axe but our “incident” wasn’t really navigationally related.

Excellent review. Thank you for clear explanation of the report and events.

As a fellow Submariner, BZ on your very informative vid. When you described as she was slipping deeper with no propulsion and blowing the MBTs didn't help, all I could think of that's exactly how Thresher sank. Awesome show- good job!

You are amazingly good at taking what I imagine is a very long, heavily formalised report and turning it into something understandable for us normies, with all the missing context added. Thank you!

Excellent analysis and commentary of the events. Thx for your efforts.

One of the most up to date and sensitive sonars on the planet and their own noise was a biologic... possibly at 16 knots... lucky to be alive...

As a military and civilian pilot, I find this is very close to our checklists and response to emergencies. We are tested annually or every six months in a simulator for our performance during normal flight operations and emergencies. If a pilot does not perform his required actions correctly, especially in simulated emergencies, he will receive a fainting grade. He will, of course, retrain until he passes, but that failure is recored by both his company and the FAA. It becomes part of his permanent record. I guarantee you a few failures and you are out of a job. I am surprised that more action was not taken to remove the individuals who where not performing correctly before they went to sea. This was a wonderful analysis of submarine operations. I found it very interesting and eductational.

One day I would love to listen to you explain the entire departmental structure of a sub. The bit in your intro was fascinating and I would love to learn more about the various departments and divisions aboard ship. :)

That was a WILD ride. I'm reminded of several times that Drach, Jamie, and Dr. Clarke have talked about problems in peacetime chain of command and culture in multiple navies. This incident appears to have both some of the same problems that they've mentioned, and some contrasting ones. I'm very curious to see what conclusions on that line of evaluation we see in this case in the near future.

I imagine 16 knots with no idea what's below/ahead in a submarine is like driving a car with 60mph in thick fog.

Wow. You REALLY explained that well throughout the whole video. Thx!

I was an STS2 on board Connecticut during this whole event and all the events leading up to it to include the pier allision in San Diego. The COB was relieved by our squadron CMC and never returned. The CMC was later relieved by an entirely new COB.

Terrific video. Wonderful and inciteful analysis of the accident investigation. The incompetent skipper was an expert in unmanned vessels, they say! The Navy command structure is so overwhelmed by fear over equal opportunity officers that they allowed this dude to stay in command when he clearly was unfit.

Don't you worry about anything, a 3 billion dollar sub is taken out of service but that CO's friends that made sure he stayed a CO are going to be just fine.

great production quality. This is great channel and Aaron speaks like a pro. great job.

Thank you, Aaron. That was an excellent walk through.

Thoughts and prayers for all the professional NAVs, ANAVs, OODs, and QMOWs out there. Also the FTs and STs out there that are gonna get roped in just because. This group is total clown shoes and caused SO much extra training for so many people. On a professional note as a former sub dude, this scenario is the stuff of nightmare. I spent a ton of time in the DOOW seat. Holy crap, seriously. A grounding followed by uncontrollable broach, then the EMBT fails, then you lose PLO, then you get propulsion back and lose the trim system due to fire. I had a few.... interesting days at work, but nothing of this magnitude.

Very interesting and well explained. Thank you.

Very instructive not just for navies but for general people skills in problem solving.

I’ve been waiting for your analysis of this !!