Commander Herman Pfaeffle is the 9th commanding officer to be fired in 2010. He was the skipper of FFG-32 - USS John L. Hall. The ship hit a pier nearly a month after he assumed command. His photo and bio have been removed from the official USS JOHN L. HALL website and the Chain of Command page is listed as "UNDER CONSTRUCTION".Commander Pfaeffle was fired by Vice Adm. Harry Harris, 6th Fleet commander. The pier strike occurred during a port visit to Batumi, Georgia (part of the former Soviet Union).
USS John L. Hall was conducting joint drills with Ukrainian naval pilots and the Georgian coast guard in the Black Sea.
Commander Pfaeffle is a former enlisted submarine Sailor mustang. He entered the Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps through the Navy’s Broadened Opportunity for Officer Selection and Training (BOOST) Program and received his commission in 1993.
Something really smells here. There are only two possibilities - CO was incompetent or Big Navy is incompetent. Press articles all say due to hitting pier BACK IN APRIL...one month after COC. Someone on another Blog mentioned "three strikes" including a May allision.
ReplyDeleteIf it is three strikes, then he deserves it! If it is just the pier incident and the damage/incident was significant enough to warrant firing, then why did it take over two months?
I was the SMOW that day. The pilot hit the pier because he wanted to drive in like a car pulling alongside a driveup window. The captain had no fire. CDR Lavan, the previous CO, would've said 'not with my ship, you don't.' CDR Pfaeffle just kept saying 'I don't think it's a good idea'.
ReplyDeleteNever heard of three strikes, and I was surprised he wasn't relieved for so long. 6thFleet sent an investigator, who interviewed everybody, and turned in his report, then the axe fell. I guess they wanted to give him a chance.