From the U.S. Government Accountability Office, www.gao.gov Transcript for: After 2017 Collisions, What is the Navy Doing to Reduce Sailor Fatigue and Workloads? Description: After two separate collisions involving U.S. Navy ships in 2017, which resulted in the deaths of sailors, the Navy found that overworked, fatigue sailors and training deficiencies contributed to the accidents. Since then, the Navy has taken steps to address these issues. Today we’ll get an update on the Navy's efforts from GAO’s Cary Russell. Related GAO Work: GAO-21-366, Navy Readiness, Additional Efforts Are Needed to Manage Fatigue, Reduce Crewing Shortfalls, and Implement Training Released: May 2021 [Intro Music] [Cary Russell:] The Navy is not crewing its ships to the required levels and that exacerbates the problem of fatigue that we're seeing throughout the Navy today. [Holly Hobbs:] Hi, and welcome to GAO's Watchdog Report. Your source for news and information from the U.S. Government Accountability Office, celebrating 100 years of fact-based, nonpartisan government oversight. I'm Holly Hobbs. After two separate collisions involving U.S. Navy ships in 2017, which resulted in the deaths of sailors, the Navy found that overworked, fatigue sailors and training deficiencies contributed to the accidents. Since then, the Navy has taken steps to address these issues. Today we'll get an update on the Navy's efforts from GAO’s Cary Russell, an expert on military training and operations, and a Director in our Defense Capabilities and Management Team. Thank you for joining us, Cary. [Cary Russell:] Thanks for having me. [Holly Hobbs:] So Cary, let's start with the issue of fatigue. What steps has the Navy taken to address fatigue and have those steps worked well? [Cary Russell:] Yes, the Navy is taking a number of steps since those collisions. It's modified shift rotations to better balance workload and sleep. It's also re-evaluated workload and crew sizing. And most notably, in 2017, the Navy issued a policy that instructs its commanding officers to implement fatigue management practices on board its surface ships across the Navy. However, the implementation of this policy has been inconsistent. For example, only about 14% of recently deployed officers actually received the recommended 7 hours or more of sleep needed for optimal performance and safety. 67% of officers received only 5 hours or less of sleep. So put another way that means 86% of officers are not getting enough sleep aboard their ships. And this is particularly significant because if an individual goes without sleep for a prolonged period of time, their cognitive and physical abilities becomes substantially degraded. It's almost as if someone's intoxicated. So this lack of sleep really presents a serious risk to ship operations and safety. [Holly Hobbs:] So, Cary, how do we know, how does GAO know, sailors are not receiving adequate sleep? [Cary Russell:] So when we started this review, the Navy hadn't measured the extent of fatigue across the fleet. So we conducted our own survey. We used a web based, generalizable survey of officers who recently deployed and that stood watch in key positions that are responsible for managing sailors and critical ship functions. These are officers of the deck, maybe a tactical action officer, or an engineering officer of the watch. We also worked with the Navy's own fatigue management experts in order to develop survey questions that really get behind and accurately describe fatigue conditions on Navy ships as we conducted our survey. [Holly Hobbs:] So is the Navy also collecting data on sailor sleep habits? [Cary Russell:] Yeah, they actually are. And as it turns out, as we were developing our survey, the Navy also conducted a survey of their own. And they came to very similar conclusions that we did regarding the severity of fatigue across the Navy. The Navy is taking additional steps to collect more data on fatigue. So, for example, they've added specific fatigue management questions to routine ship command climate surveys that are conducted every year and a half. They've also instituted a new program that would collect data from sailors that wear wrist-worn trackers while they operate and while they sleep on board a ship. These are really good steps, but one thing they don't do is they don't collect information about all the root causes of fatigue and inadequate sleep. Things like crew shortfalls, collateral duties that might compete for sailors’ time aboard ships, and administrative and training requirements. We also found that the Navy doesn't really have a process for analyzing the data it does collect. And this is important because having timely information on sailor fatigue levels can really help commanders of those ships make real time decisions on how to mitigate the risks of fatigue and improve the safety in the operations of the ships under their command. [Holly Hobbs:] And what about sailors' workloads? What was the problem there, and what steps has the Navy taken to address that issue? [Cary Russell:] Back in 2017, we identified several problems with how the Navy was calculating the size of its crew. We made several recommendations to improve it. And since that time, the Navy has made changes to its process and is now increasing the required number of crew members to better match to the ships workload. However, even though the required number of crew members is increasing, the Navy's not actually assigning enough sailors to fill those required levels. So for example, we found that in September of 2020, the Navy experienced an average shortfall of around 15% across all of its Navy ships. So that's a significant shortage basically still in place. And what this means in practice is that a ship's workload is still being distributed across too few sailors and being assigned to sailors that might not have the required skills to effectively conduct that work. [Holly Hobbs:] And so you mentioned skill gaps. Training deficiencies also contributed to the collisions in 2017. What has the Navy done to address those issues? [Cary Russell:] Well, the Navy is actually in the process of implementing a new training initiative. It's intended to provide more timely and targeted training to enlisted sailors. It's a pretty ambitious effort though, overall, because they're attempting to deliver modernized training content like videos, an interactive courseware to sailors across their career and wherever they may be, whether it's on shore or in between deployments, or even on ship during deployments and under way. In order to make this initiative successful, the Navy is going to have to overcome a couple of significant obstacles. For one, the Navy is going to need to significantly upgrade IT infrastructure in order to make it work. Additionally, the Navy is going to need to account for this added workload that sailors are going to have to spend on training while they're underway, and it's going to have to factor that into its crew calculations in order to avoid making the current fatigue problems even worse than what they are. [Music] [Holly Hobbs:] So it sounds like the Navy has taken steps to address issues of fatigue and overwork among sailors, and to address training deficiencies that contributed to the 2017 collision-all in an effort to prevent future accidents, but that these steps are incomplete. Cary, did we make any recommendations to the Navy to help it address factors causing fatigue and sailors workloads? [Cary Russell:] Yes, we did. We made eight recommendations. Four of those address fatigue and the need to get at the root causes and collect and analyze the data on that. Another couple of recommendations go towards improving the tracking and reporting on crew levels to senior leadership to inform their decision making. And then the other recommendations really address the need to factor in new training requirements into the Navy's workload calculations, and to better project personnel needs for the future. [Holly Hobbs:] And last question, what's the bottom line of this report? [Cary Russell:] The key takeaway really is that fatigue remains a persistent and significant challenge in the Navy. Most sailors are receiving less sleep than is needed for optimal performance and for safety. In addition, the Navy's not crewing it ships to the required levels and that exacerbates the problem with fatigue that we're seeing throughout the Navy today. And without accurately measuring the extent of these shortfalls, the Navy, it's really at risk of continuing to see fatigue and over work issues well into the future. [Holly Hobbs:] That was Cary Russell talking about GAO's recent review of Navy readiness. Thank you for your time, Cary. [Cary Russell:] Thank you, appreciate it. [Holly Hobbs:] And thank you for listening to the Watchdog Report. To hear more podcasts, subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Google Podcasts and more. And make sure you leave a rating and review to let others know about the work we're doing. For more from the congressional watchdog, the US Government Accountability Office, visit us at GAO.gov.