PATTAYA: The US Navy has introduced new measures aimed at avoiding a repeat of two deadly crashes in the Asia-Pacific region involving its warships and commercial vessels.
Seventh Fleet commander Vice Admiral Phillip Sawyer's comments Monday followed another incident on the weekend, when a US guided-missile destroyer was slightly damaged when a Japanese tug drifted into it during a towing exercise off central Japan.
The US Navy announced a series of reforms this month aimed at restoring basic naval skills and alertness at sea after a review of deadly collisions in the Asia-Pacific region showed sailors were under-trained and over-worked.
Two of the incidents - collisions with commercial vessels involving guided-missile destroyers, the Fitzgerald in June off Japan and then the John S McCain in August as it approached Singapore - killed 17 sailors.
The crashes were caused by preventable errors by the sailors on board the ships, Navy investigations showed.
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the International Fleet Review 2017,, Sawyer said the Navy made "circadian rhythm" sleep guidelines a requirement and a new group, the Naval Surface Group Western Pacific, has been training officers at the fleet's headquarters in Yokosuka, south of Tokyo.
"This is a team that is now in Yokosuka and they're charged with doing the man, train, equip aspect of our operations with surface ships," Sawyer told reporters.
"The second thing we have done is Automatic Identification System and that's a system onboard ships that puts out signal and it tells whoever is receiving that signal the course, speed and identification of the ship," he said.
"The third thing is that we are working on the circadian rhythm onboard the ships" to make the sailors more alert.
Sawyer took command of the US force in August after the Navy removed the fleet's previous commander, Vice Admiral Joseph Aucoin, following a series of collisions.
Vice Adm Sawyer's US Seventh Fleet operates in the largest of the US Navy's numbered fleets. It oversees about 70-80 ships and submarines at any given time in the region.
The fleet operates over an area of 124 million sq km from bases in Japan, South Korea and Singapore.