It’s taken them 2 years to figure out that manual throttles are safer?
I wonder if this will hold true for other naval vessels.
Interesting. They still have a manual helm or steering wheel.
Ten sailors aboard the McCain were killed on Aug. 21, 2017, when the destroyer turned into an oil tanker in the Singapore Strait. The collision was the result of a series of errors by the McCain's crew that began when a watch stander mistakenly transferred steering to another station.
In the confusion that followed, only one of the McCain's two propellers was slowed, causing the McCain to turn faster into the oil tanker's path, the National Transportation Safety Board found in a recent report.
That's because the ship's port and starboard propeller throttles were not linked – known as "ganged" when the lee helmsman tried to reduce the McCain's speed to avoid the tanker, the NTSB's June 19 report said. The helmsman didn't realize the starboard propeller was turning much faster than the port one, putting the McCain on a collision course with the tanker.
Were there no old timers on board to warn of the possible problems? And, if there were, did anyone pay attention to them?
More @ Navy putting physical throttles on destroyers after touch-screen system contributed to deadly collision
