Navy Relieves Skipper of Duty After Collision

SAN DIEGO —  The commanding officer of the San Diego-based destroyer involved in a fatal collision two weeks ago off Malaysia has been relieved of his duties, Navy officials announced Saturday.

Cmdr. John M. Cochrane, skipper of the destroyer Kinkaid, which collided Nov. 12 with a freighter, was relieved Friday by Vice Adm. H.H. Mauz, head of the 7th Fleet, the Navy said. The Kinkaid’s navigator was killed and five other Navy crewmen were hurt in the collision.

Cochrane was temporarily reassigned to Mauz’s office in Yokosuka, Japan, along with Lt. (j.g.) Steven M. Williams, the officer who was manning the Kinkaid’s controls when the accident took place before dawn, the Navy said.

Mauz made the move, which the Navy labeled an “administrative” and “not punitive or disciplinary” action, because he “had lost confidence” in Cochrane’s “ability to continue in command” and Williams’ “ability to serve,” the Navy said.

The Kinkaid crash was among at least 10 significant accidents involving Navy forces that have occurred since October, including a plane crashing into an apartment complex, a jet dropping a bomb on a cruiser and the accidental bombing of a Southern California campsite.

Two days after the Kinkaid and the freighter collided in the Straits of Malacca off the coast of Malaysia, Navy officials announced an unprecedented service-wide safety review. The Navy halted the normal operation of all its ships, aircraft and shore-based units for a three-day “safety stand-down.” That took place last week.

The Navy has suffered at least 102 fatalities in accidents this year, the highest in a decade.

In the Kinkaid accident, a navigator, Lt. Sean Michael McPhee, 24, of Santa Rosa, was killed as he rested in his berth. Four of the five other Navy crew members hurt in the crash were taken to a hospital in Singapore.

The Kinkaid was on its way from the Indian Ocean for a scheduled port call in Singapore when the collision occurred about 240 miles northwest of Singapore. The Kinkaid, a 563-foot destroyer, collided with the Kota Petan, a 439-foot Panamanian-registry freighter, which was headed from Singapore to the Middle East.

The collision ripped a 15-by-56-foot hole above the waterline on the starboard side of the destroyer.

Officials do not know why the two ships collided. Mauz ordered Cochrane and Williams to remain with his staff through the investigation of the crash by Rear Adm. G.L. Chesbrough, commander of the 7th Fleet’s Surface Combatant Force. Chesbrough is stationed at Subic Bay, the Navy’s large base in the Philippines.

No date has been set for the completion of the investigation.

Because Mauz’s action was labeled “administrative,” that means “the investigation has not been completed but that early indications are that it would be prudent to have a new commanding officer aboard,” Cmdr. Doug Schamp, a Navy spokesman in San Diego, said Saturday night.

Schamp stressed that he could not speak directly for Mauz or for the 7th Fleet. But he said the “word is out in the fleet” that alcohol or drugs played no part in the crash.

Further, he said, the “administrative action of relieving a commanding officer is not that unusual” because the “ultimate responsibility of what happens on a ship rests on the shoulders of the commanding officer.”

On Friday, Cmdr. David Hart took over the Kinkaid, which is docked at a shipyard in Singapore for repairs, the Navy said.