Another TITANIC, except for the Grace of God.

The M/S Explorer, a Canadian cruise ship, sank after it hit an iceberg in Antarctic waters, 23 Nov 2007. A Norwegian cruise ship rescued everyone aboard.
Someone is not being completely honest about this cruise ship. A hole the size of a fist will not sink a ship, not even the worse rust bucket. This was a Liberian registered vessel. That means it was registered under a flag of convenience to avoid safety inspections and compliance with the Coast Guard's safety regulations in the USA or England.
The Captain, Bengt Witman, was Swedish. Engineering Officers came from Bulgaria. Some of the crew came from the Phillipines. G.A.P. Adventures, a Canadian, company owned the ship. The G.A.P. owner and CEO is Mr. Bruce Poon Tip, a personal friend of Former Vice President Al Gore. Mr. Poon Tip had invited Vice President Gore and his wife, Tipper Gore, to tour the Antarctica onboard the M/V Explorer. Passengers paid $8,000.00 per person for a cabin, based on double occupancy.
Also, ships are deliberately compartmentalized to prevent them from sinking until more than one-third of the living spaces are completely flooded. Did this ship have water tight compartments? Did it have a double bottomed hull?
My ship, USCGC Glacier (WAGB-4) was punctured while I was onboard but not on watch by the underwater projection of an iceberg which was more than 2 miles away on the surface. Reserve Lieutenant junior grade Bill Pitt was the Deck watch Officer on duty on the Bridge. He violated a Standing Order of Captain E. E. "Gene" McCrory. We were prohibited from coming closer than 5 miles from an iceberg that we could see on the surface because the underwater projections could go for miles in any direction.
Multi-year pack ice is so hard that a bergie bit made of multi-year pack ice can cut through a steel reinforced hull like a hot knife through warm butter.
This iceberg was made of multi-year blue pack ice that is almost as hard as a diamond on the Moe Scale, and it ripped open a fuel tank and we lost over 10,000 gallons of fuel. And it flooded an engine room. We had free-communications with the sea; but, we dogged the hatch to that compartment and experienced no danger of capsizing or sinking. Ships are designed that way.
It is hard to sink a ship. A hole the size of a fist would not sink a ship. Even if you do not seal off the compartment, a standard bilge pump could easily pump out the volume of sea water entering through the fist size hole.
Was the M/S Explorer equipprd with bilge pumps? Were they working? What was the pumping capacity of one of the bilge pumps? Even the smallest bilge pump would be capable of pumping out the amount of sea water that could be expected to enter the ship through a hole the size of a man's fist.
Moreover, most ships have double bottoms. The iceberg would have to be shaped like a battering ram to penetrate both bulkheads and flood the compartment. Even then, because of the compartmentilization of the ship she would not sink. Even if disabled, and badly listing to one side, the ship would stay afloat indefinitely. It would not sink.
The Chilean navy said the entire MS Explorer finally slipped beneath the waves Friday evening, 23 November 2007, about 20 hours after the predawn accident near Antarctica's South Shetland Islands. It took less than a day to sink. A properly maintained seaworthy ship with compartmentalization would stay afloat indefinitely. It would be virtually unsinkable. The EXPLORER was unseaworthy. It was a death trap. Only by the grace of God did we avoid a second TITANIC. It is a wonder still that not one of the senior citizen passengers died from exposure to the Antarctic elements.
Most of the body's heat escapes through the top of the head. In Antarctic Survival Courses they teach that the most important part of the body to cover is the head. One can quickly die of hyperthermia if exposed to the elements without a hat. The water temperature was 2 degrees (Centigrade) or 34 Degrees (Fahrenheit). The ambient air temperature was probably close to that. If there was any wind at all, the added chill factor would quickly strip the body of bodyheat. If passengers were rushed to life boats without coats or hats, and then floated in the open Antarctic Ocean for 6 hours or more, it is a small miracle that no one died.

COUNTDOWN TO A CASTROPHE.
A TIMELINE TO A TRAGEDY.

M/V Explorer launched 1969.
Sank in Antarctica 23 Nov 2007.
About 2400hrs (Midnight) 22 Nov M/V Explorer hit an iceberg or bergie bit causing fist-sized hole in hull.
About 0015 hrs 23 Nov ship hit an ice floe causing a crack in the hull spanning several compartments. This was the second collision. This was most likely a stress fracture. If you apply pressure on an area of the hull under great stress, it will crack like an egg shell. In such a case the hull and the bulkheads will open up like a ripe watermellon.

About 0030 hrs M/V Explorer made International Distress Call. (MayDay, MayDay) An Argentine Rescue and Command Center picked up the distress call amid reports the ship was taking on water despite efforts to use onboard pumps. (This was according to Capt. Juan Pablo Panichini, an Argentine navy spokesman.)


0230 hrs Flooding shorts-out all electrical power.
0300 hrs 23 Nov Captain, Bengt Witman, gives order to abandon ship. All 91 passengers take to life boats, and 13 Officers remain onboard with the Capt.
0500 hrs Captain and 13 officers abandon ship.
1100 hrs M/V Nordnorge begins rescuing passengers from the water.
Water temperature is 33 Degrees (Fahrenheit), or 2 Degrees (Centigrade). Water freezes at 32 Degrees Fahrenheit.
2000 hrs (800 PM) 23 November 2007 M/V Explorer sinks beneath the frigid waters with thousands of gallons of fuel and oil. The first Antarctic ecological tragedy.

The Guardian reported that inspections this year found 11 deficiencies
in the ship, including missing search-and-rescue plans and
lifeboat-maintenance problems. Lloyd's List reported the Explorer had
five deficiencies in its last inspection in May, including watertight
doors that were not as required.

Andrea Salas, a guide on the cruise which had left Ushuaia in her native Argentina 12 days earlier, said: “I was in the ship’s bar having a drink with colleagues and some passengers when two passengers from the cabins below came in shouting, ‘There’s water, there’s water!’ ”

Crewmen struggled for an hour to strip walling and insulation from the cabin to reach the foot-wide hole but water poured down a 2in-wide scupper pipe used to remove condensation from the cabin. It flooded the engines below and there was a power cut, knocking out the bilge pumps which had been clearing the water from the hull.

Peter Svensson, the Explorer’s first officer, said: “In the water we tried to cover the hole — we managed it at first but then we got a small blackout and the water started coming in more.”

As the Explorer began to list at 25 degrees, an order was given to abandon ship.

Raymond King, 67, on holiday from Belfast, said: “It was pretty horrific. It was wet, it was cold, it was scary. I’ve got the clothes I am wearing, my watch, my camera and that’s it.”


The M/S Explorer sank within 20 hours of hitting the ice floe. That can mean only one thing. The ship was not seaworthy. It was unsafe and had no business carrying passengers for hire. It was a liability.
Someone is trying to limit their liability with these false stories about a hole the size of a fist, and othersuch nonsense.
The Norwegian vessel, Nordnorge, picked up 154 people - all the passengers and crew of the cruise ship M/S Explorer. It supposedly hit an ice floe before dawn on Friday and immediately began taking on water. There were 13 American tourists onboard. Incidents of this nature are sure to become more common in the Arctic as global warming makes the Northwest Passage more accessible.

Captain Bengt Witman gave the order to abandon ship after the Canadian ship began listing sharply to starboard. This was only 2 hours after the collision. Everyone boarded lifeboats and inflatable rafts. Only one in four life boats had an motor that would start. That means that 75 percent of the life boats were defective. If he had waited a mere ten minutes more to give the order to abandon ship, all the life boats on the starboard side would have been under water. That means half the life boats would have been unavailable. Was the one life boat with a working engine on the starboard side? A rare calm in Antarctic seas and the swift response of a passing ship helped save all aboard. If the seas had been rough, and the life boats had had no engine power and no manueverability, and some of the passengers were not properly dressed, then we would be looking at a major tragedy; ie, a Second Titanic.

One passenger described it this way, "We huddled together and tried to comfort each other and stay warm.We were drifting because out of four lifeboats, only one had an engine that worked. The greatest sight was when a helicopter came over."

The passengers huddled together for warmth as they floated for five hours in sub-zero temperatures in the frozen wastes of the Antarctic ocean, not knowing when they would be rescued.

At one point the flooded engines of the Explorer roared back into life and the vessel, by now listing at 45 degrees, began to churn the water as it moved backwards in a circular motion perilously close to the survivors' lifeboats.

The 2,400-ton vessel’s Mayday messages were picked up by two other liners, the Nordnorge and the Endeavour, and by a Brazilian warship. They took five hours to reach the scene as a Chilean navy helicopter hovered overhead and coastguards from Falmouth in Cornwall co-ordinated the rescue with their counterparts in Argentina and the United States.


The captain of the Norwegian ship said the passengers and crew were cold and wet but in good condition despite spending four hours in icy, windswept seas off the South Shetland Islands. By Friday evening, several hours after the rescue operation was complete, the stricken Explorer disappeared beneath the Antarctic waves.

The rescue ship landed the Explorer's crew and passengers on nearby King George Island, despite delays caused by high winds and seas. They stayed at Chilean and Uruguayan military stations on the island, and were flown to Punta Arenas on the Chilean mainland as soon as weather conditions permited.

A Canadian adventure company, G.A.P. Adventures, owned the sunken vessel, which had been on a 19-day tour of the Antarctic and the Falklands. Passengers paid 4,000 British Pound Sterling each for the tour.
American Ely Chang of Urban, Calif. was among the first to get out of a Chilean Hercules C-130 in Punta Arenas, clutching his life jacket like a precious souvenir and reminder of anxious hours spent adrift.
"It was very cold but I'm so happy because we all survived this and everyone's all right. Now I'm going home," he said.
Dutch citizen Jan Henkel said he decided to propose to his girlfriend Mette Larsen after they survived the ordeal.
"There were some very frightening moments but the crew was very professional and the captain very good and had everything under control," said Henkel.
Others in Antarctica counted the survivors lucky.
"They were fortunate because other ships just happened to be in the area and came to their aid rapidly," said Lieutenant Col. Waldemar Fontes, chief of the small Uruguayan base where the rescued tourists and crew took shelter overnight. "The seas were calm and there weren't any storms. That doesn't happen often in Antarctica."















There were 154 people aboard the ship, including 91 passengers from 14 countries. Twenty-three British passengers dominated the list, followed by 17 Dutch, 13 Americans and 10 Canadians. The passengers came from more than a dozen countries, including Britain, the Netherlands, the United States, Canada and Australia. They were all evacuated to Punta Arenas, Chile.





An Argentine rescue and command center first received a distress call from the Explorer at 12:30 a.m. EST (0430 GMT) Friday, 23 November 2007 amid reports the ship was taking on water despite efforts to use onboard pumps, said Capt. Juan Pablo Panichini, an Argentine navy spokesman.

Bob Flood, 52, a scientific journal editor and ornithologist from the Scilly Isles who had joined the £4,000-a-head cruise to give lectures about birds such as the albatross and the storm petrel, said: “We didn’t panic because we knew there must be other cruise ships in the area. The bizarre thing was that people began to tell Titanic jokes.”


Capt. Arnvid Hansen, whose cruise ship Nordnorge rescued the castaways, said Explorer's distress call came hours before dawn and he steamed 4 1/2 hours "full ahead" to the rescue before weather could close in.
"We have to work together with the forces of nature, not against them," Hansen said.
He said blinding sleet, fog, high winds and treacherous seas are common in Antarctica, Earth's windiest continent, even in the October-to-April "summer" when cruise ships flock to the area by the dozens.
"I've been a captain for four seasons in Antarctica," Hansen said. "It's not dangerous but sometimes it's tricky and it's a challenge."
Hansen said calm seas and benevolently light winds prevailed as his crew took just an hour to collect the 154 passengers and crew, rounding up their lifeboats and rubber rafts as the crippled Explorer listed every more steeply to starboard, its hull gashed.
High seas would have made picking up the lifeboats much trickier and would have exposed the castaways to brutally cold weather and the chance of hyperthermia.
Shortly after the rescue though, winds began picking up considerably. After midday, when he reached a Chilean base at King George Island nearby, the winds and waters were so rough the captain had to wait hours to unload the passengers.
"The weather can change in a half hour in Antarctica and you never know if we are going to have it very good one moment or very bad," Hansen said.

The Nordnorge used its own lifeboat as a “lift”, lowering and raising it to bring the 91 passengers, nine expedition staff and 54 crew of the Explorer aboard 10 at a time from their four lifeboats and eight dinghies.

The operation took half an hour. Three of the passengers were suffering from hypothermia and had to be clad in thermal blankets and fed hot drinks until they recovered.

Jerry DeCosta, vacationing on the Explorer said "Everything was done right: The captain got everybody off and the weather was ideal. It was a fluke of nature and luckily we got out," he said, marveling at Nordnorge's swift response. "We sent out a distress call and people came to help."

Guillermo Tarapow, captain of an Argentine navy icebreaker, Almirante Irizar, that caught fire last April 10 off Patagonia while returning from Antarctica, said he thought the dangers of castoff Antarctic ice to shipping were on the rise.
Tarapow, who saved his stricken ship from sinking and won praise for safely evacuating his 296 passengers, said he has seen a dramatic increase in the number of icebergs over 20 years and blamed climate change.
"You now see many more icebergs ... where there didn't use to be. It makes navigation difficult and they are all very dangerous," Tarapow said.


Less than a year ago, M.S. Nordnorge was involved in another Antarctic rescue. The Norwegian cruise ship evacuated 294 passengers after another ship from the same cruise company, M.S. Nordkapp, ran aground on a remote Antarctic island. The Nordkapp was later refloated.

Lt.-Col. Waldemar Fontes, chief of the Uruguayan base where some of the rescued tourists and crew took shelter, on 24 November said "We would tell them: 'You're shipwreck victims.' They'd say they wanted to stay. They were having fun."
The attitude may seem strange, he said, but the passengers had reason to be happy.
"If the storm that kept them from disembarking (the Norwegian ship that rescued them) had hit while they were on the lifeboats, it's quite possible many of them wouldn't have survived. "It's that harsh, really. They were very lucky."

The British luxury passenger liner Titanic sank on April 14-15, 1912, en route to New York City from Southampton, Eng., during its maiden voyage. The vessel sank with a loss of about 1,500 lives at a point about 400 miles (640 km) south of Newfoundland.

The great ship, at that time the largest and most luxurious afloat, was designed and built by William Pirrie's Belfast firm Harland and Wolff to service the highly competitive Atlantic Ferry route. It had a double-bottomed hull that was divided into 16 presumably watertight compartments. Because four of these could be flooded without endangering the liner's buoyancy, it was considered unsinkable. Shortly before midnight on April 14, the ship collided with an iceberg; five of its watertight compartments were ruptured, causing the ship to sink at 2:20 AM April 15. Inquiries held in the United States and Great Britain alleged that the Leyland liner Californian, which was less than 20 miles (32 km) away all night, could have aided the stricken vessel had its radio operator been on duty and thereby received the Titanic's distress signals. Only the arrival of the Cunard liner Carpathia 1 hour and 20 minutes after the Titanic went down prevented further loss of life in the icy waters.

Many of those who perished on the ship came from prominent American, British, and European families. Among the dead were the noted British journalist William Thomas Stead and heirs to the Straus and Astor fortunes. The glamour associated with the ship, its maiden voyage, and its notable passengers magnified the tragedy of its sinking in the popular mind. Legends arose almost immediately around the night's events, those who had died, and those who had survived. Heroes and heroines, such as American Molly Brown, were identified and celebrated by the press. The disaster and the mythology that has surrounded it have continued to fascinate millions.

As a result of the disaster, the first International Convention for Safety of Life at Sea was called in London in 1913. The convention drew up rules requiring that every ship have lifeboat space for each person embarked (the Titanic had only 1,178 boat spaces for the 2,224 persons aboard); that lifeboat drills be held during each voyage; and, because the Californian had not heard the distress signals of the Titanic, that ships maintain a 24-hour radio watch. The International Ice Patrol also was established to warn ships of icebergs in the North Atlantic shipping lanes.

On Sept. 1, 1985, the wreck of the Titanic was found lying upright in two pieces on the ocean floor at a depth of about 4,000 m (about 13,000 feet). The ship, located at about 41° 46' N 50° 14' W, was subsequently explored several times by manned and unmanned submersibles under the direction of American and French scientists. The expeditions found no sign of the long gash previously thought to have been ripped in the ship's hull by the iceberg. The scientists posited instead that the collision's impact had produced a series of thin gashes as well as brittle fracturing and separation of seams in the adjacent hull plates, thus allowing water to flood in and sink the ship. In subsequent years marine salvagers raised small artifacts and even a 20-ton piece of the hull from the wreckage.

BACK TO THE FUTURE:




Millvina Dean, the last remaining survivor of the Titanic disaster,
seen here in 2002, is auctioning mementoes from the doomed liner to
pay for her nursing home fees.



This is a Friday, April 17, 1998 file photo of Millvina Dean, 86, a
living Titanic survivor, as she looks up and smiles as she signs a
Titanic movie poster for an enthusiast at the Titanic Historical
Society's convention in Springfield, Mass. As a 2-month-old baby,
Millvina Dean was wrapped in a sack and lowered into a lifeboat from
the deck of the sinking RMS Titanic. Now Dean, the last living
survivor of the disaster, is selling some of her mementos to help pay
her nursing home fees. Dean's artifacts, including a suitcase given to
her family by the people of New York after their rescue, are expected
to sell for about 3,000 pounds (US$5,200) at Saturday's auction in
Devizes, western England. Dean, 96, has lived in a nursing home in the
southern English city of Southampton Titanic's home port since she
broke her hip two years ago.


Commander P.H. Nargeolet walks away from the M.V. Royal Majesty with
Millvina Dean, 84, of England at the Black Falcon Pier in Boston in
this September 1, 1996 file photo. Dean, a surviver of the Titanic
disaster was on board the Royal Majesty when it sailed to the site
where the Titanic's maiden voyage ended 84 years ago and watched as
research vessels tried to raise part of its hull to the surface.
Although a cable snaped sending the hull plunging down to the ocean's
floor, Dean was thrilled to be there.

Webster Smith and John Miller, Cases in Controversy.

http://www.amazon.com/CONDUCT-UNBECOMING-Officer-Lady-Conviction/dp/1460978021

Webster Smith is 0 for 2, but John K. Miller is batting a thousand. The System does not work for everyone. It did not work for Webster Smith. He made love to his girlfriend and was charged with rape. During that year he assisted her in recovering from the residual affects of an abortion and continued to date her.

John K. Miller forcibly sexually assaulted a total stranger, resulting in his receiving a broken nose; yet he is still on course, steady as she goes.
On Nov. 12, 2006 Coast Guard Cadet John K. Miller was arrested at the Navy Lodge hotel in Groton on charges of third-degree sexual assault, first-degree unlawful restraint and second-degree breach of peace. That cadet, John K. Miller, a 19-year-old from Michigan, was at a party with other cadets in a hotel when, police said, he assaulted a female guest, who is not a cadet. Police said there was alcohol at the two-room party. Miller had prevented his victim from leaving one of the rented motel rooms, police said, and forced her to have sexual contact that was not traditional intercourse, according to one officer.
.When he was arrested, John Miller was bleeding and had sustained a broken nose. Whoever broke his nose must have been a pretty tough cookie. A 6 foot 2 inch 200 pound football player is no pushover, even when he has been drinking. The victim was not a member of the Track or Volley Ball team. She was a civilian.
Cadet Miller was treated at Lawrence Memorial Hospital. He was released into the custody of the Commandant of Cadets at the Coast Guard Academy after posting $10,000 bail.

Miller - a member of the academy football team - was in Superior Court in New London on Monday, December 4th, wearing a jacket and tie. He was not in his Coast Guard cadet uniform. He spoke with a judge for a moment, just long enough to have another appearance set: a Jan. 8 pretrial hearing.
Leaving the courthouse, he chose not to comment on his case.

Miller continued attending classes and living in Chase Hall, the academy barracks. That is a switch from the situation with Webster Smith, who was immediately removed from any exposure to other cadets, prevented from going to class, and forced to work at hard labor on the boat docks.

Cadet John K. Miller is a white Caucasian; whereas, Cadet Webster Smith is a Black African-American. They were both football player at the Academy, but that is where their similarities end. Webster Smith was singled out for special punishment and character asassination. His cadet photo was released to the news media early in the investigation process to achieve maximum exposure. Cadet John K. Miller has been shielded from exposure. He was not been removed from the cadet barracks at Chase Hall. He is still attending classes. He has not been subjected to pre-trial punishment. Webster Smith was forced to work at hard labor on the boat docks. The treatment of the two cadets has been as different as night and day.

The ink was hardly dry on Admiral James Van Sice’s Approval of the Sentence in the Smith case when John Miller was arrested for sexual assault. The Assistant Superintendent, Captain D. R. May, said that the Smith case had shown the resolve and commitment to our system of military justice, accountability and most important, our true embodiment of the Coast Guard’s core values of Honor, Respect and Devotion to duty. He asserted that the Academy Superintendent would never waiver from his commitment to these precious values and will ensure that they are always present in all that is done at the Academy.
It was really fortunate that the John Miller was arrested for sexual assault so soon. It provided Captain May and the Academy senior staff with a timely and appropriate opportunity to demonstrate their commitment to core values and to equal protection of laws. Time has shown how selective they have been in living up to their own standards.

The accusations against Webster Smith were internal, so the investigation was conducted by the Coast Guard and ended in a military General Court-martial. Smith was placed in jeopardy of imprisonment from 20 years to life. In John K. Miller's case, he was arrested by Groton police and faced a criminal trial in civilian court.
10/10/2007 The Day reported the results of John K. Miller's civilian trial.
If cadets John K. Miller and Steve Schimmel stay out of trouble, the criminal cases against them will be dismissed.
John K. Miller and Steve Schimmel were arrested in separate incidents last fall and dismissed from the academy in January 2007.
Miller was accused of sexually assaulting a person at a party and preventing the victim from leaving the room at the Navy Lodge on Nov. 12. Groton Town police charged him with third-degree sexual assault, first-degree unlawful restraint and second-degree breach of peace. Police said Miller was among a group of people who had rented rooms at the lodge and were partying.
Miller was placed on a two-year form of special probation called accelerated rehabilitation in New London Superior Court on April 23, 2007. He cannot contact the victim or go to the academy. He must also undergo an alcohol evaluation and any other evaluation, counseling or treatment deemed necessary by the Office of Adult Probation.
Miller and his attorney, Paul F. Chinigo of Norwich, declined to comment.
According to court documents, Miller's application for accelerated rehabilitation was granted because the court believed he probably will not offend in the future; he has not been adjudicated as a youthful offender within the past five years; and he has no previous record. (Webster Smith had no prior record. As a matter of fact he was a choir boy)
The victim was notified of the agreement and the case was continued to April 24, 2009, where it will most likely be dismissed and Miller's record absolved if he abides by the conditions. (Webster Smith carries the stigma of a registered sex offender.)
Schimmel is accused of forcing his way on Oct. 29 into the house of a couple who said he was intoxicated at the time. New London police charged him with second-degree criminal trespass, second-degree criminal mischief and breach of peace.
His attorney, John M. Newson of Norwich, said Tuesday that Schimmel paid the couple full restitution to repair the broken door, between $1,100 and $1,200, in February. In exchange, the state did not pursue the charges, he said.
The case is still open but as long as Schimmel does not commit another offense, it will be closed and dismissed in March, Newson said.
This kid was intoxicated to the point that he didn't know what he was doing, but he had an impeccable background and no one was physically hurt,she said. The victims were scared, but overall this was the right result. The victims got their door and my client went about his way.
Wow, the System really works, if you are white, you are right; But, if you are Black, baby, get back. These three cadets; two white, and one Black, clearly demonstrate the unequal protections afforded American citizens of different racial persuasions. In America, being Black is clearly hazardous to your health.

The U.S. Coast Guard Court of Criminal Appeals has scheduled oral arguments in the Case of The Appeal of the Court-martial Conviction of Cadet Webster Smith for January 16, 2008 in Arlington, Virginia.

A legal brief filed by his lawyers claims the convictions should be thrown out because the defense team was not allowed to fully cross-examine one of his accusers during Smith's court martial. They say that meant the jury didn't hear testimony that the accuser, a female cadet, Shelly Raudenbush, had once had consensual sex with a Coast Guard enlisted man and then called it sexual assault.
Lt. Cmdr. Patrick M. Flynn, the government's lawyer for the appeal, said 27 November that the jury "heard enough" and the trial judge was within his rights to impose reasonable limits on the cross-examination.
"They didn't need to hear the additional details the defense is arguing they should have been allowed to hear."

Lawyers from the WilmerHale law firm for former Coast Guard cadet Webster Smith also contend in their legal brief “The excluded cross-examination would have devastated Shelly Raudenbush's(the accuser's) credibility, on which the government's case depended completely, making it all but certain that the outcome in this pure credibility contest would have been different."
The convictions on the three charges were based on the testimony of the female cadet, who said Smith coerced her by threatening to reveal a secret she had confided in him. That secret was about the past relationship.
Besides the question of whether the military judge abused his discretion, oral arguments will focus on whether Smith's conviction for sodomy was constitutional and whether the government proved the extortion charge.
Smith's lawyers argue that Smith engaged in private, consensual sexual activity with another adult and should not be punished.

Smith's lawyers said the evidence does not prove the extortion charge because prosecutors did not demonstrate a direct link between the female cadet's presumption of a threat and a sexual encounter, which occurred a few hours apart. She said Smith told her he needed more “motivation” to keep her secret, according to the records.

“Criminal sanctions cannot be based on the subjective perceptions of the recipient of a communication, perceptions that the communicator plainly cannot control,” Smith's lawyers argued in the records.
The court may hear arguments about the failing to obey an order and abandoning watch charges or issue a ruling based on the briefs filed by both sides.

The defense also is asking the court to set aside Smith's convictions on two lesser charges of failing to obey an order and abandoning watch.

Webster Smith is 0 for 2.

http://www.amazon.com/CONDUCT-UNBECOMING-Officer-Lady-Conviction/dp/1460978021

Ms Carmen Walker would rather be consistent than be correct. She has been consistently wrong in the Webster Smith case. Moreover she is shamefully arrogant in her ignorance. If ignorance could fly, her office would be an airport. And if knowledge, judgment, insight, discernment or even common sense and fair play were dynamite, her entire staff would not be able to scrape together enough to blow her nose.
The gap between common sense and legal reasoning are so far apart in her decision as to be farcical. In the pantheon of agency legal opinions this decision is akin to a pig in a tutu, wearing a tiara and a red ruby in her nose trying to compete in the Miss Universe Contest. This is both comical and pathetic. Ms Walker has no fear of gazing into the abyss of ignorance.
It seems as if Ms Walker having come out this way, and gone down this road, finds it impossible to go back. She cannot find it in her soul to get back on the right track. She is determined to live on the wrong side of history like a cow watching a train pass by. Whoever coined the phrase “stuck on stupid” had a premonition.
It appears that Webster Smith has exhausted his administrative remedies. His only recourse is to request an EEOC hearing within 30 days of Ms Walker’s 26 October letter; and he can file an appeal in the Federal District Court within 90 days of the EEOC’s final decision.



(Feb 24, 2009)Independent Audit Finds USCG Office of Civil Rights Incompetent.

Employees in the Coast Guard’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR) do not have the skills or up-to-date training to handle many of the service’s cases and formal discrimination complaints are not adequately handled, according to an independent report presented to the Coast Guard on February 5.

Terri Dickerson, the office’s director, requested an independent review April 25, 2008, less than one month after an investigation by the Coast Guard Investigative Service, Naval Criminal Investigative Service and the FBI failed to determine who left nooses for a Black Coast Guard Academy cadet and an officer conducting race-relations training in the summer of 2007.

At the same time, an unofficial Coast Guard blog was posting regularly about the office and the director’s alleged inefficiencies, reducing morale among employees and casting OCR in a negative light, according to the report.

The findings are “deeply disturbing and completely unacceptable,” Cummings, D-Md., wrote in a letter to Commandant ADM Thad Allen. Cummings, the chairman of the House subcommittee on the Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation, said he plans to call a hearing in April to further discuss the report.

“The findings of this report demand decisive and comprehensive action to correct what appear to be a number of significant shortfalls in the administration,” he wrote.

The Coast Guard retained Booz Allen Hamilton, a consulting firm with offices throughout the country, to review the entire civil rights program in September 2008, according to a letter from Dickerson to the Department of Homeland Security’s Equal Employment Opportunity Programs.

Coast Guard spokesman Cmdr. Ron LaBrec said the service is thankful for the feedback and is conducting a thorough review of the report and its recommendations.

“The [DHS] Office of Civil Rights and Liberties periodically conducts assessments on its civil rights components and the [OCR] director wanted to do this report now with the ongoing modernization initiative to look across the board and improve the practices in the office and address any allegations that were coming out of blogs or even internal discussions. We take allegations of mistreating [privacy issues] seriously,” LaBrec said.

According to the report, the Coast Guardsmen assigned to ORC often come in with little civil rights experience and serve two-year tours, and “often they leave their post just as they are becoming oriented to the position.” The other Coast Guardsmen in the office are on collateral duty, with the same limited backgrounds, according to the report.

Although training is available, the report said, many employees have not completed the legislatively mandated initial or refresher training. In some instances training was behind up to five years.

“Some staff members lack the requisite skills, abilities, and training to effectively perform the duties of their positions, thereby diminishing effectiveness of the divisions/teams,” according to the report.

LaBrec said the “decentralized” structure led to the delinquency in training and the Coast Guard is looking to “standardize” and “improve” its training program. There are 22 full-time positions within OCR, five of which are military, but that likely is not enough to sufficiently handle the additional responsibilities related to the increased caseload, according to the report.

Although Booz Allen acknowledges that some of the recommendations listed in the report cannot be accomplished with the office’s $788,459 budget, OCR’s Web site says the recommendations are under review and lists some that have either already been completed or can be accomplished in the near future.

Those include:

• Restructuring the office to “optimize the use of our military personnel” and take advantage of existing training and resources.

• Analyze the workload to ensure statutory and non-statutory obligations are being met.

LaBrec said it is too early to determine what recommendations would require additional funding or how much additional money would be needed to accomplish those goals.

“The review reaffirmed many positive aspects of the Coast Guard civil rights program. The report also makes clear there is work ahead,” Dickerson wrote in Thursday’s Alcoast. “Foremost, consistent with past similar studies, the BAH team found we must restructure the [equal employment opportunity] function, and secondarily, shore up our equal employment opportunity/equal opportunity product lines so that they more optimally support our civil rights service providers and work force.”

LaBrec also said the 58 formal civil rights complains OCR received in fiscal year 2007, roughly one per 1,000 people, shows the office is doing some things right, since several of the other DHS departments have a much higher number of civil rights complaints per capita.

Allen told Coast Guard Academy cadets and faculty in October 2007 that racial bigotry will not be accepted and goes against the service’s ethos and humanitarian mission. In August 2008, he released a service-wide message outlining plans to improve diversity throughout the service.

As part of the new initiative, every flag officer and senior executive service member is required to attend one diversity conference a year and they are expected to build relationships with minority-based “institutions of higher education.”

The first noose, which garnered national attention, was left in the bag of a Black cadet in July 2007 onboard the Coast Guard cutter Eagle. The second was found in August on the office floor of a white female officer who had been conducting race relations training.


Not only Carmen Walker, but others in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) have gone out of their way to protect the Coast Guard. Judging from what happen to Tony D'Armiento, a civilian employee of the U.S. Coast Guard, I would not advise Webster Smith to try to go into DHS Headquarters for a sit down face-to-face with Ms Walker. The hired help sound like they were recruited from Blackwater Security rejects. Blackwater is alleged to have wasted 17 Iraqi civilians on the streets without as much as a car back fire to justify the shoot-out at the Baghdad Corral. Consider the case of Tony D'Armiento as reported in the Washington Post Sunday, 16 December 2007.

A civilian U.S. Coast Guard employee was placed on paid administrative leave, threatened with a criminal investigation and confronted by guards at gunpoint in retaliation for disclosing information embarrassing to the service's troubled fleet replacement program, his attorney said.

Anthony D'Armiento, a former Northrop Grumman systems engineer working for the Coast Guard's acquisitions department, asked the Bush administration to appoint an independent inspector general to investigate his allegations against staff members of Richard L. Skinner, inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security. D'Armiento's attorney called their actions "an egregious act of intimidation and excessive force" against a government whistle-blower.

D'Armiento was placed on leave Oct. 1 and told to cooperate with Coast Guard investigators or face criminal prosecution, said Debra S. Katz, his attorney, in a letter to Skinner and the White House.

D'Armiento cooperated, but after he was told he could retrieve his office and home computers from Skinner's offices in Rosslyn on Oct. 29, Paul Weare, an investigator for the DHS inspector general, attempted to question D'Armiento. When D'Armiento refused to answer, three guards appeared, one pointed a gun at his chest, denied him his equipment and threatened him with arrest if he returned, Katz said.

"Mr. Weare was trying to lure Mr. D'Armiento to the OIG office where he could be further interrogated without his attorney present," Katz said in the letters, copies of which were obtained by The Washington Post. "This staged armed confrontation was an extreme and transparent act of retaliation against Mr. D'Armiento."

Skinner's office did not respond to repeated requests for a comment. A DHS official confirmed that D'Armiento is under investigation.

The Coast Guard said in a statement that "unauthorized disclosure or improper handling of sensitive, classified or proprietary information is strictly prohibited and may result in administrative or criminal charges."

Katz wrote that when D'Armiento declined to speak with Weare in an interrogation room and said, "I want my computer back now," Weare told him to "back off" and "get out of [his] face." After a guard drew his handgun, prompting D'Armiento to say he would call the police, a guard replied, "We are the police," Katz wrote.

Katz said that, on Sept. 25, D'Armiento turned over to a fellow whistle-blower Coast Guard documents marked sensitive but unclassified, and that the papers showed that the agency was aware of hundreds of defects in communications equipment aboard its new, $640 million flagship vessel, known as the National Security Cutter. The ship is part of the Coast Guard's $25 billion fleet replacement program, known as Deepwater.



In the documents, dated August and September and reported by Wired magazine's Web site, Coast Guard officials noted the probability that the first of eight planned cutters "will be unable to process classified information." Nevertheless, the Coast Guard appeared prepared to accept responsibility for correcting some defects at added taxpayer expense after delivery, even though that was the contractors' obligation, D'Armiento alleged.

Coast Guard officials called the criticism premature. They said the authorities were aware of the reported defects. "We're not going to accept [delivery of] a cutter with any kind of major problems," Coast Guard spokeswoman Laura Williams said.



The vessels are being built by Northrop Grumman with electronics provided by Lockheed Martin. The first cutter, the Bertholf, whose price tag has doubled since 2002 and whose delivery was delayed from August to April, is undergoing trials at sea. The second and third of eight planned ships are under contract, estimated to cost $500 million each.

The Coast Guard is also addressing design flaws that could lead to fatigue cracks well before the end of the first cutter's 30-year life span.

The US standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet,
8.5 inches. That's an exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used? Because that's the way they built them in England, and English expatriates built the US railroads.

Why did the English build them like that? Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that's the gauge they used.

Why did "they" use that gauge then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building wagons, which used that wheel spacing.

Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing? Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads in England , because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts.

So who built those old rutted roads? Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads in Europe (and England) for their legions. The roads have been used ever since.

And the ruts in the roads? Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels. Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome, they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing.

Therefore the United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is
derived from the original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot.
Bureaucracies live forever.

So the next time you a re handed a Specification/ Procedure/ Process and
wonder "What horse's ass came up with it?" you may be exactly right.
Imperial Roman army chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the
rear ends of two war horses. (Two horses' asses.)

Now, an added twist to the story:

When you see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two big
booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are solid
rocket boosters, or SRBs. The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their factory in
Utah . The engineers who designed the SRBs would have preferred to make them
a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to
the launch site. The railroad line from the factory happens to run through a
tunnel in the mountains, and the SRBs had to fit through that tunnel.The
tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track, as
you now know, is about as wide as two horses' behinds.
So, a major Space Shuttle design feature of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's ass. And you thought being a horse's ass
wasn't such a big deal?

Ancient horse's asses control almost everything....and CURRENT Horses Asses
are controlling everything else!!

The U.S. Coast Guard Court of Criminal Appeals has scheduled oral arguments in the Case of The Appeal of the Court-martial Conviction of Cadet Webster Smith for January 16, 2008 in Arlington, Virginia.A legal brief filed by his lawyers claims the convictions should be thrown out because the defense team was not allowed to fully cross-examine one of his accusers during Smith's court martial. They say that meant the jury didn't hear testimony that the accuser, a female cadet, Shelly Roddenbush, had once had consensual sex with a Coast Guard enlisted man and then called it sexual assault.
Lt. Cmdr. Patrick M. Flynn, the government's lawyer for the appeal, said 27 November that the jury "heard enough" and the trial judge was within his rights to impose reasonable limits on the cross-examination.
"They didn't need to hear the additional details the defense is arguing they should have been allowed to hear."
The defense also is asking the court to set aside Smith's convictions on two lesser charges of failing to obey an order and abandoning watch.

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces

450 E Street, Northwest

Washington, D.C. 20442-0001



SCHEDULED HEARINGS




United States v. Webster M. Smith, No. 08-0719/CG

(Appellee) (Appellant)



Counsel for Appellant: Ronald C. Machen, Esq.

Counsel for Appellee: LT Emily P. Reuter, USCG



Case Summary: GCM conviction of going from place of duty, attempting to disobey an order, sodomy, extortion, and indecent assault. Granted issue questions whether the military judge violated Appellant’s constitutional right to confront his accusers by limiting his cross-examination of [SR], the government’s only witness, on three of the five charges.



NOTE: Counsel for each side will be allotted 20 minutes to present oral argument in this case.