On Friday evening, a ferry rammed the sea wall on one of the canary islands (Gran Canaria). Reports say 5 people had to go to hospital.

Videoclips: [URL]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x33DkWy5v_o[/URL]

The "power failure" must have been in control systems. The vessel seemed to be under motive power until nearly the end.

[QUOTE=kladner;457279]The "power failure" must have been in control systems. The vessel seemed to be under motive power until nearly the end.[/QUOTE]

According to the article [URL=http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4434890/Ferry-crash-Gran-Canaria-hospitalises-five.html]here[/URL], [QUOTE]Video footage showed the ship - which was heading towards the neighbouring island of Tenerife with 140 passengers, 30 crew members and dozens of vehicles on board - adrift and at the mercy of the sea before it hit the concrete wall at the entrance to Luz Port in the Gran Canaria capital Las Palmas.[/QUOTE]

I must say, I'm puzzled. I'm not a nautical expert, but in the video the ship certainly doesn't [I]look[/I] like it was "adrift and at the mercy of the sea" as it approached and then hit the wall. From the wide white trail behind the ship, it looks like the propellers had been turning for quite some time. The bow wave makes it look like the ship was actively pushing through the water. From the trail behind the ship, it also looks like it had been moving parallel to the wall, then turned hard to port.

I just looked again at the video, and agree with your more detailed observations. It is leaving a substantial wake, and is trailed by prop wash. It clearly had made an abrupt turn.

[QUOTE]
USS Fitzgerald (DDG 62) was involved in a collision with a merchant vessel at approximately 2:30 a.m. local time, June 17, while operating about 56 nautical miles southwest of Yokosuka, Japan. As of this time, there have been two patients requiring medical evacuation... Other injured are being assessed. There are seven Sailors unaccounted for; the ship and the Japanese Coast Guard continue to search for them.
[/QUOTE]US Navy article:
[URL]http://www.c7f.navy.mil/Media/News/Display/Article/1217717/uss-fitzgerald-collision-update-1012am-jst-june-17-2017/[/URL]

US Navy Releases USS Fitzgerald Supplemental Line of Duty Investigation[B]

[URL]http://www.c7f.navy.mil/Media/News/Display/Article/1282167/navy-releases-uss-fitzgerald-supplemental-line-of-duty-investigation/[/URL]
[/B]

Have there been any further pronouncements as to the nature of the "inattention" by bridge crew, leading to the collision? I know that officers were removed from duty, but I could not find a determination of what the sequence of events was.

[QUOTE=kladner;465919]Have there been any further pronouncements as to the nature of the "inattention" by bridge crew, leading to the collision? I know that officers were removed from duty, but I could not find a determination of what the sequence of events was.[/QUOTE]
I have read that there are several investigations into that, but all are still in progress, so there are no public reports about the causes yet.

Two ferries have sunk this week in Brazil:
[URL]http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-41042849[/URL]

[QUOTE=Nick;465934]I have read that there are several investigations into that, but all are still in progress, so there are no public reports about the causes yet.[/QUOTE]
And now another US destroyer has gotten t-boned by a merchant ship. What are those [STRIKE]cowboys[/STRIKE] people doing out there, what with all their fancy and expensive hardware? :confused2:

[QUOTE=kladner;466321]And now another US destroyer has gotten t-boned by a merchant ship. What are those [STRIKE]cowboys[/STRIKE] people doing out there, what with all their fancy and expensive hardware? :confused2:[/QUOTE]

After the [i]USS Fitzgerald[/i] collision, its three top officers were relieved of command, as described [url=https://www.stripes.com/news/pacific/navy-relieves-senior-fitzgerald-leaders-after-avoidable-deadly-collision-1.483444]here[/url].

After the [i]USS John S. McCain[/i] collision, the Navy [url=http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/08/21/u-s-navy-pauses-after-losing-two-guided-missile-destroyers-in-pacific/]ordered a fleet-wide "operational pause"[/url].[quote]The loss of the two ships comes after years of squeezed defense spending that commanders say has limited training and truncated maintenance.

“This a Navy that has not had the operational focus that having a serious opponent provided it,” said Bryan McGrath, a defense consultant and former commanding officer of a guided missile destroyer.

“The readiness is fraying as a result of uneven resource streams, which means that maintenance gets deferred,” he said.

The inability in Congress to pass defense budgets in a timely fashion means that often “basic training is truncated,” McGrath added. “It’s worth looking into whether the operational requirements are impacting the Navy’s ability to do the kind of basic blocking and tackling of training for maneuver and navigation.”[/quote]Then the Navy [url=http://www.navy.mil/submit/display.asp?story_id=102073]fired the commander of the Seventh Fleet[/url].