Associated Press

Broken equipment, civilian guests and a rush to get back on schedule contributed to the fatal collision between a nuclear submarine and a Japanese fishing boat, a Navy admiral testified today.

A lawyer for the commander of the USS Greeneville, saying his client had done everything he could to detect the boat and avoid the collision, immediately questioned the admiral’s findings and said the Navy’s investigation of the Feb. 9 accident was incomplete and inaccurate.

“You had some time constraints placed on you that made it difficult ... to do a thorough and complete investigation,” said Cmdr. Scott Waddle’s civilian attorney, Charles Gittins, in his questioning of Rear Adm. Charles Griffiths Jr.

Griffiths conducted the Navy’s preliminary investigation. He spent his third day testifying in a Navy court of inquiry into why the Greeneville hit and sank the Ehime Maru on Feb. 9, killing nine people. Gittins began his cross examination after the three admirals overseeing the court completed their questioning.

The court of inquiry will help determine the fate of Waddle, his second in command, Lt. Cmdr. Gerald Pfeifer, and the officer of the deck, Lt. j.g. Michael Coen. They could face courts-martial. The inquiry is expected to last several weeks.

“What went wrong?” asked Vice Adm. John Nathman, who is overseeing the court.

Griffiths concluded that five main factors may have led to the collision:
—A rush to complete an emergency surfacing drill, which was pushed back nearly 45 minutes because of delays including a long lunch for the civilian guests.

—A lack of qualified sonar operators.
—Broken equipment that could have helped detect the Japanese ship.
—The number and location of 16 civilians aboard the Greeneville.
—A command climate in which crew members were unaccustomed to questioning Waddle because they trusted his skills.

Griffiths has described a ship on which several enlisted personnel, from the skipper to a sonar analyst and an officer accompanying civilian guests, could have done more to ensure the safe operation of the sub.

However, Gittins told the court Waddle stressed “safety, efficiency and backup” in managing his crew. He asked Griffiths whether Waddle “demonstrated a good deal of expertise in commanding his vessel and operating it.”

“Certainly,” Griffiths responded.

“Do you have any reason to believe that Cmdr. Waddle did not use his best judgment?” Gittins asked.

“I have no reason to believe otherwise,” the investigator said.

The Greeneville was demonstrating an emergency surfacing drill for its civilian visitors when it rammed the Ehime Maru, causing it to flood and quickly sink. Twenty-six aboard the vocational fishing vessel were rescued, but nine, including four teen-agers, never were found.

A fire control technician who analyzes sonar data apparently determined that a vessel was close, but said he didn’t report it to Waddle because the civilians blocked his access to the commander.

Griffiths testified that Waddle, with his ship running behind schedule, rushed preparations for the drill and did not give sonar operators enough time to obtain accurate data showing the position of surface vessels. The commander also did not raise his periscope high enough or look long enough to see the other ship.

However, Griffiths acknowledged under cross examination that Waddle may already have decided to return to port late and made arrangements to do so.

“My logical connection to being generally behind schedule and trying to catch up was my assumption,” he said. “Maybe that’s not the case.”

“If your assumption is wrong,” Gittins noted, “that places the commanding officer’s action in a different light.”

Griffiths also backed off his testimony that a senior officer visiting the Greeneville, Capt. Robert Brandhuber, thought Waddle was moving too fast to prepare for the drill. He said a better characterization was the commander was doing things more quickly than Brandhuber would have. Griffiths said Brandhuber didn’t necessarily consider what Waddle was doing unsafe.

As the admirals wrapped up their questioning of Griffiths, one court member tried to zero in on why, despite any other procedural failures, Coen and Waddle didn’t detect the Ehime Maru during periscope scans.

“It’s still perplexing to me that they didn’t see this contact,” said Rear Adm. Paul Sullivan, the only court member who served on a submarine similar to the Greeneville.

Griffiths said it was overcast and hazy, with ocean swells of six to eight feet. The Ehime Maru was a white vessel, making it more difficult to see in cloudy conditions.

Also, the vessel was approaching the submarine at a 30-degree angle, which would appear through a periscope as one half of the length of the boat — not the entire boat.

Nevertheless, Griffiths said Coen and Waddle should have seen it if they had looked through the periscope longer. When Coen did his scan, he had a periscope range of 2,000-4,000 yards. Waddle had an even broader range, 4,000-6,000 yards. The Ehime Maru was, at most, 2,600 yards from the Greeneville.

Kazuo Nakata, father of a missing teacher who was on board the boat, said he was frustated that Waddle did not make eye contact with the victims’ families in court today.

“I just do not understand why he can’t,” Nakata said. “In Japan, you would at least say hello.”

Waddle issued a statement last month expressing “sincere regret” for the crash.

On the Net:
Pacific Fleet/Greeneville: www.cpf.navy.mil/greeneville.html