21 injured in fire on Navy ship
SAN DIEGO — Twenty-one people were injured in an explosion and fire Sunday on board a ship at Naval Base San Diego, military officials said.
The blaze was reported shortly before 9 a.m. on USS Bonhomme Richard, said Mike Raney, a spokesman for Naval Surface Force, U.S. Pacific Fleet.
Seventeen sailors and four civilians were hospitalized with “non-life threatening injuries,” Raney said in a brief statement. He didn’t provide additional details.
The cause of the fire was under investigation. It wasn’t immediately known where on the 840-foot amphibious assault vessel the blast and the fire occurred. The flames sent up a huge plume of dark smoke visible around San Diego.
Rear Adm. Philip Sobeck, commander of Expeditionary Strike Group 3, told the San Diego Union-Tribune that the Navy thinks the fire began somewhere in a lower cargo hold where marine equipment and vehicles are stored.
There was no ordnance on board, Sobeck said. There are a million gallons of fuel on board, he said, but that is “well below” any heat source.
The explosion was probably caused by a change in air pressure, Sobeck told the Union-Tribune.
San Diego is the Bonhomme Richard’s home port, and the ship was undergoing routine maintenance at the time of the fire.
About 160 sailors and officers were on board, Raney said, far fewer than the thousand typically on the ship when it’s on active duty. All crew members were accounted for, said Admiral Mike Gilday, Chief of Naval Operations.
Because of its age, a fire could be particularly destructive, especially if it reached the engine room and other tight spaces with machinery, said Lawrence B. Brennan, a professor of admiralty and international maritime law at Fordham University in New York.
“The heat of a fire of this nature can warp the steel, and that can be a major problem for any ship,” said Brennan. “On an older ship, it’s even more of a problem.”
Two other docked ships, USS Fitzgerald and USS Russell, were moved to berths away from the fire, officials said.