Title: Sailor Shortages and Lack of Training May Leave Navy Ships in
Disrepair

Description: Over the last 30 years, the Navy has assigned fewer
personnel to ships. The goal was to reduce costs. But there have been
concerns that fewer sailors has made it harder to maintain ships. And it
could also have broader consequences for Navy readiness. We surveyed
executive officers and visited some ships to learn more about this
issue. GAO's Diana Maurer tells us more about this issue.

Related Work: GAO-24-106525, Navy Readiness: Actions Needed to Improve
Support for Sailor-Led Maintenance 

Released: September 2024

{Music}

[Diana Maurer:] Navy sailors are struggling and their ability to
maintain and repair ships at sea and ships at port.

[Holly Hobbs:] Hi, and welcome to GAO's Watchdog Report, your source for
fact based, nonpartisan news and information from the U.S. Government
Accountability Office. I'm your host, Holly Hobbs. Over the last 30
years, the Navy has assigned fewer personnel to ships. The goal was to
reduce costs. But there have been concerns that fewer sailors has made
it harder to maintain ships. And it could also have broader consequences
for Navy readiness--that's the Navy's ability to have a well-maintained,
combat-ready fleet needed to safeguard the U.S. We surveyed executive
officers and visited some ships to learn more about this issue. Joining
us to talk about a new report is GAO's Diana Maurer, an expert on
military readiness. Thanks for joining us.

[Diana Maurer:] Thank you.

[Holly Hobbs:] So, Diana, maybe we can start with, what kind of
maintenance are sailors expected to do?

[Diana Maurer:] So sailors are expected to keep the ship that they are
on operational, up and running. So whether the ship is out at sea or
whether it's at port--sailors on board that ship, they're doing the day
to day maintenance of all the different systems on the ship. So weapons
systems, radars, all the things that are necessary for life aboard the
ship, they need to maintain those systems and they need to make minor
repairs if something goes wrong. In many respects, you can think about
how you maintain your car. There are simple things that you do on your
car every single day to help hold off those major malfunctions or those
major problems that can happen later on down the road. It's the same
thing with a large Navy ship. The maintenance that the sailors are
performing helps head off bigger maintenance problems down the road. So
from that perspective, it's really important that the sailors have the
time, the parts, and the training that they need to do those repairs and
perform that maintenance.

[Holly Hobbs:] So are they actually able to make these repairs?

[Diana Maurer:] We found that all too often they've really struggled to
be able to do that. And there are a variety of reasons. First and
foremost, there aren't enough sailors to go around. So we knew from some
of our prior work when we looked across the Navy for every six positions
that the Navy says it needed aboard ship, it only had five sailors
assigned. So right out of the box, you're only talking about five
sailors to do the work that was designed for six. In this review, we got
behind those numbers and found that when we looked at the number of
sailors who were actually available for duty on a particular day, it was
even less. So there's a significant sailor shortage, which hinders our
ability to do the necessary work. We also found that all too often, the
sailors were too junior for the positions and responsibilities that they
were assigned. And that was in part because the more senior level
positions were simply vacant. We also heard from sailors, as well as
officers aboard ships, that they all too often did not have enough spare
parts. And they were sometimes hampered by having poor or incomplete
instructions on how to do the required maintenance or perform the
necessary repairs.

[Holly Hobbs:] So you just hit on something I'm interested in. We did
talk to executive officers and leaders on these ships. What did they
tell us about this issue?

[Diana Maurer:] We heard a lot from the executive officers. So we
surveyed the Navy's entire battle fleet. So 230 plus ships. We got a
tremendous response rate. We heard back from over 90% of the executive
officers. That's over 90% of the number two ranking officer across the
Navy's fleet. And among other things, we asked them how difficult it was
for sailors to perform the necessary maintenance and repair aboard ship.
More than 60% of these executive officers reported that it was
moderately or extremely difficult for their sailors to perform the
necessary repairs and maintenance aboard ship. That's concerning. They
also expressed significant concerns about lack of spare parts. 88% said
it was moderately to extremely difficult to perform the repairs with the
number of parts that they had on board ship. So there's significant part
shortages. And over two-thirds had significant concerns about the
training sailors received to perform the maintenance and the repairs
that were necessary aboard ship. So a lot of concerns across a wide
variety of topics. 

[Holly Hobbs:] What about the sailors themselves? What did they tell us
about their ability to make repairs?

[Diana Maurer:] So we heard quite a bit from the sailors as well. They
were particularly concerned about the quality of the training that they
received. Many of the sailors just flat out said that the training that
they received was inadequate. They felt that there was too much reliance
on classroom training. A lot of that training was via PowerPoint. They
wanted to get more experience, more hands-on examples of what they would
really be required to do once they were aboard ship. And when you have
an inadequately trained sailor and there aren't enough sailors, then
it's not surprising that maintenance and repairs can suffer when they're
on the high seas or back in their port.

[Holly Hobbs:] One of the things that report talks about is a new IT
system that's meant to help with this issue, or track what's needed on
the ships. Is that actually going to help sailors manage maintenance
better?

[Diana Maurer:] Well, the Navy certainly hope so. And we hope that the
Navy is able to implement this. What we heard from sailors and officers
is that right now aboard ship, sailors are relying on at least six
different IT systems to track maintenance, to order new spare parts, and
to record when they've completed maintenance. So you can just imagine
their frustration when they're moving between all these different
systems to talk about and report out on their day to day maintenance and
repair responsibilities. Having a single system, which the Navy's in the
process of developing, could be very helpful in addressing some of those
inefficiencies.

[Holly Hobbs:] We're reporting on this issue now, but this is a problem
that the Navy is aware of too. Is the Navy doing anything about it?

[Diana Maurer:] They definitely are. They certainly recognize that
they're facing shortfalls and shortages in the number of sailors. So
they're working on the recruiting end of that. They have some efforts
underway to enhance their training. So, for instance, the Navy is trying
to do more with online training, more training on demand, allowing
sailors to be aboard ship and kind of pull up a laptop or tablet to get
more information on how to fix things. But that's going to require them
provide hardware, software, and improve or address the challenge of
having sufficient internet bandwidth aboard ship. So there's a lot of
things that they still need to do to carry out what they plan to do.

{MUSIC}

[Holly Hobbs:] Diana just told us that there are widespread concerns in
the Navy about sailors' ability to complete maintenance and repairs on
ships--including staffing shortages, training issues, and even the
tracking of needed repairs. So, Diana, what more should the Navy be
doing to address this issue?

[Diana Maurer:] Well, you know, the Navy has a slogan--Get real, get
better. And it's what their leadership is doing to drive change right
now. And so we think that the recommendations we have in this report
fall squarely within the realm of getting real, helping them get better.
So, for example, we recommended that the Navy do a better job of
tracking the real numbers of sailors who are actually aboard ships to
help them better understand the breadth and the depth of their sailor
shortage. We also recommended that they take a more comprehensive look
at the kinds of training that they're offering sailors trying to find a
better balance between classroom training. Some of that is necessary, as
well as the on-the-job training, in addition to shoring up the other
training efforts that we talked about earlier. They can also do a better
job of providing a better level of spare parts and the necessary number
of parts that a particular ship needs, as well as doing a better job of
providing the instructions that sailors need to perform the necessary
maintenance and repair. So a number of recommendations that'll help the
Navy get to better results.

[Holly Hobbs:] Last question. What's the bottom line of this report?

[Diana Maurer:] Right now, Navy sailors are struggling in their ability
to maintain and repair ships at sea and ships at port. That's a problem,
because it hinders the Navy's overall ability to maintain readiness and
meet operational responsibilities. First and foremost, the Navy faces a
problem with a shortage of sailors. It currently does not have the
number of sailors that it needs. That's a problem for today. But it's
also a problem for the future. The Navy wants to build more ships, but
there are open questions about whether it will have the number of
sailors it needs for the larger fleet it wants to build in the future.

[Holly Hobbs:] That was Dianne Maurer talking about our new report on
the Navy's readiness. Thanks for your time, Diana.

[Diana Maurer:] Thank you.

[Holly Hobbs:] And thank you for listening to the Watchdog Report. To
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