Reductions in manning are possible without compromising damage control, but it will require fundamental changes—such as replacing this typically tiny escape scuttle with access shafts that can accommodate firefighters in full gear.
As we approach the 21st century, the Navy's leadership has made a commitment to reduce the cost of operating ships, primarily by reducing crew size. The ultimate goal is the widely publicized DD-21—a 10,000-ton ship with a crew of 95. To get there, the Naval Sea Systems Command is working closely with industry to exploit advanced commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) technology and new concepts in how a ship is operated. The USS Yorktown (CG-48), the Navy's "Smart Ship," was modified with many of these systems and has been testing them in an operational environment.
Using technology to reduce crew size is nothing new—the commercial maritime industry has been doing it for years as a cost-cutting measure, manning 100,000-ton tankers with crews of fewer than 30. In truth, the Navy has been cutting personnel too, albeit at a far slower pace. One only has to compare the crew-size of an 8,000-ton cruiser in World War II (800-1500 crew) to that of an Arleigh Burke (DDG-51)-class destroyer of the same size today (326 crew).
For the most part, this manpower reduction is driven by automation. Systems such as remotely operated guns, ammunition hoists, and computer-controlled fire control radar all eliminated requirements for manning, but the real gains have been made in engineering departments. Gas turbine technology—and the remote monitoring that comes with it—has done more to reduce crew complement than any other single action. The entire crew complement on a modern destroyer is smaller than the engineering department of a steam ship from the 1960s. When these reductions in engineering department manning were designed into the Spruance (DD-963) and Oliver Hazard Perry (FFG-7)-class ships, naysayers insisted it would never work. Time proved that the reliability of the gas turbine plant equaled or exceeded that of any steam ship built in the 1950s or 1960s.
The problem the Navy faces now is identifying other places to make personnel cuts. Even on non-Smart Ship platforms like the Arleigh Burkes under construction today, watchstanding requirements encompass only a small fraction of the crew. Remaining personnel are assigned for maintenance and crew-support functions, and serve as a pool of personnel to combat and repair damage in battle. Today it is not uncommon for the preponderance of damage control locker personnel to come from these "support" ratings. The problem is a simple one—if you reduce all the support billets in an attempt to cut manning and increase the crew's tooth-to-tail ratio, who will do the damage control when the ship takes battle damage?
The answer lies in a combination of technology, ship design, and doctrine. New technology, much of it cheap and already proven in the civilian world, can help eliminate personnel without reducing damage control capability. Some of these systems already are being deployed to the fleet, but as the Navy finalizes the DD-21's design, decisions that will significantly affect damage control capability have to be made. Engineers already are talking about advanced fire-fighting systems. Some have even remarked that the DD-21's crew will not fight fires at all—they will just hit a button and let the ship fight the fire on its own. This line of thought represents a simplistic answer to a complicated problem.
Technology
The inherently hostile nature of the maritime environment guarantees that things rarely will work as planned. With the addition of catastrophic damage from an advanced cruise missile impact, the likelihood that these automated systems will function as designed becomes increasingly remote. New technology represents a boon to damage control efforts, but it never should be viewed as a replacement for manned action. It is only a supplement that provides increased capability.
One such technological advance already in use in the Yorktown is the Hydra radio system. While not used solely for damage control, it represents a quantum leap forward from the wire-free communications (DC-WIFCOM) system that the Navy struggled with in the 1980s. DC-WIFCOM provided hand-held radios to key damage control personnel, allowing them to communicate more quickly (and reliably) than traditional messengers or sound-powered phones. The problem with DC-WIFCOM remains a lack of clarity—under the best of circumstances it is difficult to understand what anyone is saying and when used while wearing an oxygen breathing apparatus (OBA), it becomes so difficult to communicate that repeat-backs are common. Hydra replaces DC-WIFCOM with a ship-wide, crystal-clear communications system supporting multiple channels (reducing loading on any particular radio channel). Hydra's synergistic enhancement of repair party effectiveness enabled the Yorktown to reduce manning yet still retain damage control capability. Other ships in the fleet are now being fitted with a follow-on wireless program, but far fewer radios are being provided than Yorktown received.
The Navy is committed to replacing OBAs with the Scott Air Breathing Apparatus (SCBAs)—the same yellow backpack tanks and masks civilian firefighters have been using for more than 25 years. Communication among team members is still the one remaining problem when wearing either an OBA or SCBA. The masks' voice boxes are functional, but require the speaker to shout loudly to be heard even a few feet away.
To date, the only available solution has been to equip key team personnel with electric amplifiers that increase the volume of the speaker's voice. Crews receive limited numbers of amplifiers whose reliance on transmission of sound in a potentially very noisy environment denigrates their effectiveness. Communications are further degraded by the rest of the equipment the firefighters wear. A natural replacement is a total package integrating all the equipment which protects the firefighter from heat and falling objects; provides a safe, breathable atmosphere; provides light; and allows the wearer to communicate with the rest of the fire fighting team as well as the damage control organization outside of the space.
Another system being tested in the fleet today replaces the damage control plates used since World War II. One lesson learned from the mine hits to the USS Princeton (CG-59) and USS Tripoli (LPH-10) during Desert Storm was the large amount of self-inflicted systems degradation resulting from damage control isolation efforts. With the exception of a ship's Main Space Fire Doctrine, there is little or no standing guidance on ways to isolate a specific space when damage occurs. Instead, repair party personnel rely on large DC plates depicting blueprint-like ship diagrams. Each plate depicts a different system. The self-inflicted degradations encountered in the Tripoli and the Princeton were a direct result of the way damage control plates display information. By providing a "geographic system display," a supervisor can locate the space to be isolated, locate the nearest isolation fittings outside the space, and order them closed. The problem is that the supervisor has no idea what downstream systems will be impacted by this isolation because the plates do not point them out and the only way to find out is to trace the downstream piping and identify the affected systems—highly unlikely in the chaos of responding to damage or attack. For example, a decision to isolate a chill water pipe in a passageway aft might result in a loss of chill water forward, severely degrading the ship's primary air search radar transmitter cabinet and causing a loss of air detection and tracking capability.
Common diagrams are designed to prevent this problem. Instead of depicting systems in a geographic manner, a systematic manner is used. Only those spaces which a system passes through are depicted, and higher level diagrams only depict the barest bones of the system. At critical points, the diagram merely has a "bubble" referring the user to a diagram detailing that part of the system. More important, the bubble lists what key systems are fed from that part of the system. If the decision is made to isolate that section, a supervisor already knows which systems will be affected and, by referring to the next-order diagram, can determine what realignment will provide an alternate source to the affected system. Common diagrams were tested on board the USS The Sullivans (DDG-68) for almost a year and several Total Ship's Survivability Exercises demonstrated the system's dramatic reduction of self-induced degradation.
In addition to the diagrams themselves, common diagrams provide a set of space-isolation cards. Since every system on the ship had been mapped out and validated, it was quite easy to use that database to generate a laminated card for every space on the ship. Each card provides isolation information on every system that transits or resides in that space. Locker officers use the card as a checklist for isolation, simply reporting the resulting critical equipment affected by isolation. The damage control assistant has a clear picture of the state of isolation and, more importantly, can be assured a space truly has been isolated because the isolation cards have been validated and are accurate. When changes are made to the ship's configuration, the change is noted, entered into the database, and new isolation cards and diagrams are generated. Common diagrams have been so successful that efforts are under way to develop them for the San Antonio (LPD-17), the Ticonderoga (CG-47), and new construction DDG-51 class ships.
The step beyond Common Diagrams already exists and parts of it are being tested in The Sullivans. Large (20-inch) touch screen computers possess the common diagrams on optical disk. Each diagram is hyper-linked to the diagrams above and below it in the hierarchy so that, by tapping on a "bubble," the operator can view its associated diagram. Once networked, the computers will allow a locker officer to indicate which valves have been opened or closed, or where a system is ruptured, and the DCA as well as the Captain in the combat information center, will be able to view exactly what the locker officer has put into the system, instead of relying on messages passed through voice communications. Because the system is robust enough to withstand shock damage, has power supplies independent of the ship's electrical distribution system, and enables operators to keep track of damage, damage control efforts, and isolation progress in a clear manner, common diagrams will remain far superior to the damage control plates of yesteryear.
Ship Design
While both these systems represent a jump to new technology and could be implemented at minimal cost in every ship in the fleet today, some components of damage control are so closely tied to ship design that they can only be implemented in the DD-21 now, while it is being designed. Perhaps the most critical component is the issue of space access.
For the last five years, the concept of "vertical entry" has been discussed by damage control personnel as a means of protecting firefighters who are fighting a large, main-space fire. Because heat rises, entering a main engineering space from the top (where the majority of space accesses are located) is the worst approach to take. Instead, vertical entry advocates maintain a fire party should enter the space from the bottom level where the atmosphere is relatively cool and the attack team can fight the fire directly at its base without having to deal with climbing down the ladders of a multi-level engine room to get to the fire.
To accomplish vertical entry, firefighters (in full ensembles) are lowered down an escape trunk by a harness and pneumatic hoist. Since escape trunks are so narrow, only two or three people can be at the bottom of the trunk when the space is accessed. These personnel are expected to open the door, hose down the fire, and maintain a "beachhead" into the space while additional personnel are lowered to join them. Several issues complicate this access technique. First, it can take up to three minutes per man to lower the team into the space. As anyone who has ever been in a fire can attest, three minutes can be a lifetime. Second, there is no safety device to protect the fire fighter should the hoist fail—he will drop the length of the escape trunk to almost certain injury, and there is no quick way of getting him out. Last is the issue of lowering the fire fighter. In port, this is a hazardous operation at best. With a ship dead in water, rolling in swells, a firefighter swings on the hoist like a pendulum. Advocates suggest the fire fighter simply hold on to the escape trunk rungs as he is lowered to prevent this from happening. I would suggest these people have never tried to do this in a full fire-fighting ensemble.
The answer to this vertical entry issue lies in design. There is one class of ship in the Navy today where vertical entry to the lower level of the main engine room is accomplished simply by climbing down a "stairway-type" ladder and opening a door. The Oliver Hazard Perry frigates have a fume-tight space, protected from the heat and smoke, where the fire team can assemble and enter the space on the lower level quickly and safely. In contrast, vertical entry in the Spruance, Ticonderoga, and Arleigh Burke-classes remains a controversial, unquestionably dangerous practice which many commanding officers prefer to avoid because of the risk to personnel. Again, designing the ship so that access to the lower levels of the engineering spaces is accomplished by walking down ladders takes advantage of the benefits of vertical access while avoiding risks associated with lowering fire fighters down an escape trunk.
A related access issue is escape scuttle design. In every U.S. Navy ship built since World War II, vertical isolation has been accomplished by means of a dogged-down hatch. Closing them is a laborious process where two sailors hold the hatch open while a third removes the stanchions. The hatch is then closed and dogged down with a wrench. It takes a trained team between two and four minutes to close just one hatch. Once this time-consuming operation has been accomplished, personnel move vertically about the ship by passing through an escape scuttle located in the center of most hatches. It is a 16-inch diameter scuttle closed with a wheel that simultaneously opens or closes the three dogs.
There are two problems associated with the present design. First, personnel wearing OBAs have a tendency to compress the breathing bags as they squeeze through the scuttle. As a result they lose some, if not all, of their breathing air at a time when they may be entering a toxic atmosphere and are unable to refill the bags without exiting the space. Second, personnel in full fire fighting ensembles cannot fit through an escape scuttle. As a result, when accessing a space like Auxiliary Machinery Space Number 2 on an Oliver Hazard Perry frigate, the first thing the fire party does is undog and open the full hatch. They do this while heat, toxic gas, and possibly flames are coming out the hatch, and they have limited space in which to work.
Some argue these hatches are necessary evils, essential to ensure proper vertical isolation. However, through smart design practices, vertical shafts similar to the escape trunks of today, but using "stairway" ladders, could be used to move around the ship—as emergency stairways are used in a building. Access to a space would then be accomplished through a watertight door, capable of being opened or closed by a single person in seconds.
Doctrine
The last area where damage control can be improved and implemented in every ship in the fleet today—at no cost—is in the area of doctrine. A significant part of today's damage control doctrine does not apply to a modern warship, yet still is the way we do business. To understand this, it is necessary to look at the origins of the Navy's damage control doctrine in World War II. Ships traditionally fought battles at general quarters (battle stations or GQ). At GQ, the ship was isolated to the maximum extent possible to prevent damage from cascading into additional areas of the ship. Flooding and spread of fire were prevented simply by the presence of steel bulkheads and closed doors.
During World War II, almost all weapons and sensor systems were operated manually from local stations. As a direct result, nearly the entire crew was stationed in topside areas at general quarters, leaving much of the ship unmanned. When damage occurred it was necessary to first locate the damage and then isolate it and begin repairs while the remainder of the crew kept fighting the ship. This was the genesis of the modern repair locker—a team of sailors trained in damage control responsible for a section of the ship, whose only job at general quarters was to look for damage and control it when discovered.
In today's world this tradition continues, even though the days when the majority of the crew is topside at GQ are gone. With the exception of lookouts and possibly machine or chain-gunners, there is no one topside at GQ. The blast of missile launchers and guns as well as toxic fumes these weapons produce make the topside areas unhealthy places to be. Instead, most of the crew is below decks. Those not operating the combat equipment are stationed in key spaces around the ship, waiting for system damage or failure to occur so they can troubleshoot and return their gear to full readiness as quickly as possible. An Arleigh Burke DDG is required to have three 44-man repair lockers. This means that 132 sailors of a crew of 326 have no mission at general quarters other than to sit around and wait for the ship to be damaged. This represents a gross waste of manpower because it ignores a fundamental shift in the way a modern warship is fought.
In large part, the need for investigators is obviated by the fact that most (but not all) of the spaces on the ship are manned by a few technicians at GQ and are equipped with smoke, flooding, and fire detectors. Much like repair locker personnel, their sole function in life is waiting for something to go wrong so they can fix it. If the space is undamaged, they represent a ready pool of trained personnel to assist in damage control efforts in other parts of the ship, yet current doctrine demands these trained sailors not be considered when designing the ship's damage control organization. Repair lockers are expected to act as independent entities separate from the rest of the crew, except in the traditional "mass conflagration" drill where the entire crew shifts its focus from fighting the ship to saving the ship the same way its predecessors did.
The only way to get a combat ship's crew down to 95 yet still retain full combat and damage control capability is to combine work. No longer can sailors specialize and dedicate themselves solely to damage control or combat systems repair. Instead, they must be swing players who do both, as the situation calls for. Even on today's ships, failure to use these technicians in a damage control role requires the repair lockers to be far larger than necessary. Simply by revising our doctrine we could cut 15-20 billets out of the ship's damage control organization with no degradation in damage control capability.
The Navy always has lived by the tenet that "damage control is everyone's responsibility." The time has come to make this a reality. Will it require some experimentation and willingness to change the way we do business? Absolutely. But the maritime industry has proven that minimum manning can work, if done correctly and every aspect of the ship's operations is designed to operate in the most efficient manner possible. There will be no room for people to sit waiting to fight damage on the DD-21. Why do we tolerate it on today's surface ships?
Lieutenant Commander Klain served in the USS Thach (FFG-43) and is Combat Systems Officer in the USS The Sullivans (DDG-68).