Time and time again, we keep getting more evidence that U.S. Navy aircraft carriers are one tough group of warships, despite the cost, and are hard to sink in almost any situation. Case in point: The USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75), the flagship of the Harry S. Truman Carrier Strike Group (CSG), collided with M/V Besiktas-M on Wednesday evening near Port Said, Egypt, in the Mediterranean Sea, the Navy said.
Cmdr. Tim Gorman, spokesperson for the U.S. 6th Fleet, said that the carrier did not experience any flooding, and the crew was not reported injured.
USS Truman‘s propulsion plants are unaffected. The collision occurred at approximately 11:45 p.m. on Wednesday and is under investigation. A Navy official said the damage was above the carrier’s waterline. No aircraft aboard the deck were damaged, another Navy official said.
The collision occurred outside the city, which is located at the northern opening to the Suez Canal. This area has dense maritime traffic, with ships coming in and out of the canal and others waiting to begin their transit.
M/V Besiktas-M: The Merchant Ship That Smacked a Carrier
According to ship tracking websites, the M/V Besiktas-M is a Panamanian-flagged bulk cargo ship that had just passed through the Suez Canal and was on its way to a port in Romania.
The cargo ship, which measures 620 feet long and 105 feet wide, is roughly half the size of the Truman, which measures slightly over 1,000 feet long and 252 feet at its flight deck.
The Besiktas-M was built in 2003 in Japan. It was damaged in the collision, but no crew members were injured. She is still underway, and according to the ship-tracking site Vessel Finder, she is due to arrive in Constanta, Romania, on February 18, at 0100 hrs.
According to Vessel Tracker, the merchant vessel previously collided with M/V Common Spirit in August 2016 in the Bangladesh port city of Chittagong.
Both ships had their AIS turned off. The Automatic Identification System (AIS) is a radio-based system that allows ships to broadcast their location, speed, course, and other information.
The ‘Besiktas M,’ which had been en route from Aqaba to Constanta, had sustained damage to its starboard bow and deck.
USS Truman and Nimitz-class Aircraft Carriers Are Hard To Sink
The USS Truman and the destroyer USS Jason Dunham (DDG-109), part of the carrier strike group, made a port call to U.S. Naval Support Activity Souda Bay in Greece last week.
The carrier strike group includes the flagship USS Harry S. Truman (CVN 75); Carrier Air Wing (CVW) 1, with eight embarked aviation squadrons; staffs from CSG-8, CVW-1, and Destroyer Squadron (DESRON) 28; the Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser USS Gettysburg (CG 64); and two Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers, USS Stout (DDG 55) and USS Jason Dunham (DDG 109).
The Harry S. Truman Carrier Strike Group (HSTCSG) has been in the Central Command area of operations since December 14. It supported multiple self-defense strikes against targets across Iran-backed Houthi-controlled areas of Yemen. The strikes directly contributed to CENTCOM’s campaign to degrade the Houthis’ attempts to threaten regional partners and stop their attempts to stop shipping through the Gulf.
On Feb. 1, HSTCSG conducted airstrikes against ISIS-Somalia in support of U.S. Africa Command and with coordination with the Federal Government of Somalia.
Photos showed that the collision damaged a sponson on the starboard side of the carrier to the rear of the starboard aircraft elevator. The ship was also damaged further aft, and the hulls appeared to have scraped. Although the hull was pierced, it was well above the waterline, and no flooding was reported.
The aircraft carrier was still underway in the Eastern Mediterranean and planning to pull into port so an inspection team could assess the repairs needed for the ship. However, the carrier’s airwing is still capable of conducting air operations.
The Navy said that the USS Harry S. Truman “provides a wide range of flexible mission capabilities, including maritime security operations, expeditionary power projection, forward naval presence, crisis response, sea control, deterrence, counter-terrorism, information operations, and security cooperation.”
The Blue Angels, flies over the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier, USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75) on May 20, 2020. US Navy Photo/
However, a slight collision from a bulk cargo hauler will hardly sink a supercarrier like the Truman. They are designed to withstand torpedoes, bombs, and anti-ship missiles.
The ships can withstand a lot of damage, but thankfully, the reactors and the ship’s propulsion were “unaffected and in a safe and stable condition.”, as were the complement of the carrier’s 90 aircraft.
An investigation of the accident is pending. There are, however, plenty of questions that need to be asked in the investigation. Although the area around the Suez canal is densely packed with maritime shipping, how did the bulk carrier get so close to the Truman? And if the carrier was hit by a ship of that size with bad intentions, such as if it was loaded with explosives, the results could have been much worse.
The U.S. Navy Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78) and the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75) underway in the Atlantic Ocean on 4 June 2020, marking the first time a Gerald R. Ford-class and a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier operated together underway. Gerald R. Ford is underway conducting integrated air wing operations, and the Harry S. Truman Carrier Strike Group remained at sea in the Atlantic as a certified carrier strike group force ready for tasking in order to protect the crew from the risks posed by COVID-19, following their successful deployment to the U.S. 5th and 6th Fleet areas of operation.
The USS Harry S. Truman will return to its home at the Newport News, VA shipyard for the mid-life refueling of its nuclear reactors and a routine overhaul.
About the Author: Steve Balestrieri
Steve Balestrieri is a 19FortyFive National Security Columnist. He served as a US Army Special Forces NCO and Warrant Officer. In addition to writing for 19FortyFive, he covers the NFL for PatsFans.com and is a member of the Pro Football Writers of America (PFWA). His work was regularly featured in many military publications.
