« on: July 12, 2020, 04:16:57 PM »
18 Sailors injured in three-alarm fire aboard USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD-6) at Naval Base San Diego
SAN DIEGO — A three-alarm fire onboard the amphibious assault ship Bonhomme Richard injured 18 sailors Sunday morning as multiple agencies responded to the blaze.
A spokesman for Navy Region Southwest said the location of the blaze and its extent are not known at this time.
Eighteen sailors were sent to a local hospital with minor injuries, according to a tweet from Naval Surface Forces in San Diego.
According to the Navy, 160 sailors were aboard Sunday morning. All sailors have been evacuated from the ship and are accounted for, O’Rourke said. In total, about 1,000 sailors are assigned to the ship, according to a Naval Surface Force spokesman.
The fire was reported shortly after 8:50 a.m., according to San Diego Fire-Rescue officials. The department said on Twitter at that time that at least one sailor has been injured and that 150 firefighters were assigned to the blaze. A fire investigator also was dispatched.
The cause of the fire was not known. People at the scene reported hearing an explosion.
No other information was immediately available.
The ship was in drydock at General Dynamics NASSCO in San Diego last year and has been undergoing further maintenance pierside at Naval Base San Diego. Its last deployment was in 2018.
Amphibious assault ships are used to deploy Marines in amphibious landings. During operations, the ships conduct flight operations with helicopters and jet aircraft, such as the AV-8B Harrier and its replacement, the F-35 B Lightning.
While deployed, these ships carry more than 2,000 sailors and Marines.
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During my time in the US Navy one of the ships I served on was USS Belleau Wood (LHA-3). The LHA class was the predecessor to the LHD class now in service in the fleet. If the layout of the LHD is similar to the LHA then it looks to me like the explosion that was heard took place on the hangar deck where aircraft and helos are stored and maintained. This is also why recruits are shown a film about the USS Forrestal fire during the Viet Nam war to show just how bad a fire aboard ship can be.
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