The guided-missile destroyer USS John S. McCain (DDG 56) arrives pier side at Changi Naval Base, Republic of Singapore following a collision with the merchant vessel Alnic MC while underway east of the Straits of Malacca and Singapore.
August 21, 2017 – Ten American sailors are reported missing and five injured after the U.S. Navy destroyer USS John S. McCain collided with a merchant ship east of Singapore, near the Strait of Malacca.
U.S. 7th Fleet said in a statement early Monday that the guided-missile destroyer collided with the Liberian-flagged tanker ship Alnic MC at about 6:20 a.m. local time. The McCain was headed to Singapore for a routine port visit at the time of the incident.
The McCain sustained “significant damage” to its hull, but arrived hours later under its own power at Singapore’s Changi Naval Base.
Singapore’s Maritime and Port Authority said the Alnic also sustained damage, but that there were no injures among its crew.
A Singapore Navy helicopter took four of the injured U.S. sailors to a hospital in Singapore for treatment of non-life threatening injuries.The U.S. 7th Fleet said the other injured sailor does need further care.
Singapore’s Navy and Coast Guard are also assisting with search and rescue efforts.
President Donald Trump and Sen. John McCain both tweeted they were praying for the sailors aboard the naval vessel. The ship is named for McCain’s father and grandfather, who were both admirals
It is the second collision involving a ship from the Navy’s 7th Fleet in the Pacific in two months. Seven sailors died in June when the USS Fitzgerald and a container ship hit each other in waters off Japan.
The Fitzgerald’s captain was relieved of command and other sailors are to be punished after the Navy found poor seamanship and flaws in keeping watch contributed to the collision, the Navy said last week.
Steve Bannon complicity with Nazi White Supremacists dooms Trump White House
Trump’s Shocking Statements Supporting Charlottesville Nazi Thugs
August 15, 2017 – Creating an equivalence between a group with swastikas, lit torches, and semi-automatic weapons struck many observers as patently absurd, especially given that one of those alleged white supremacists was charged with plowing into a crowd of protesters with his car, killing one and injuring 19 others. But a closer examination of Trump’s talking points shows that nearly every one has a direct link back to either someone the president follows on Twitter, or a Fox News segment since Saturday.
Trump’s manic, fantastical and utterly disastrous week
CNN’s Chris Cillizza describes Trump’s manic, fantastical and utterly disastrous week this way: “This is the nature of time in the Donald Trump presidency.”
“There are so many storylines every single day that it’s impossible to keep up with them even for a 24-hour news cycle. Some of this is, of course, strategy on the part of the President — if you throw 1,000 balls in the air, any one person can only hope to focus on a few in hopes of catching them.”
“But, ascribing strategy to every ball Trump throws may be giving him and his White House too much credit. The truth is that this is a President who creates chaos in and around him. He acts, and then watches the wildness that ensues. The plan, seemingly, is that there is no plan.”
“He’s the man knocking down the first domino in a massive chain that spiders in a thousand different directions. Or, maybe even more apt: He’s smashing the ice on a thinly frozen pond and watching as the cracks spread out around him — endangering both himself and anyone else unlucky enough to be sharing the ice with him.”
Washington
July 31, 2017
