New COVID-19 Cases On USS Theodore Roosevelt After Last Year's Outbreak

KEY POINTS

The sailors, who tested positive on Sunday, were not experiencing any symptoms
Over 1,200 sailors were infected and one died last year
The ship’s commanding officer, Navy Capt. Brett Crozier, was relieved of his command
The USS Theodore Roosevelt left Guam fifty-five days after the March 27 docking

Three sailors aboard the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt on Sunday tested positive for COVID-19, less than a year after a widespread outbreak in which over 1,200 sailors were infected and one died.

The Navy said that the three sailors did not have any symptoms and they are isolating on the ship along with those they came in contact with. All identified close contacts tested negative for COVID-19, it added.

“The ship is following an aggressive mitigation strategy in accordance with Navy and CDC guidelines to include mandatory mask wearing, social distancing, and proper hygiene and sanitation practices,” the Navy said in a statement.

“U.S. Pacific Fleet is committed to taking every measure possible to protect the health of our force. USS Theodore Roosevelt is currently underway and remains fully operational," it added.

This comes after the outbreak last year in March forced the USS Theodore Roosevelt to dock in Guam, and snowballed into a major controversy. All of the 4,800 crew members were quarantined for 14 days in Guam in a systematic manner, which left enough sailors aboard to carry out essential activities and disinfection. As sailors cleared quarantine and tested negative, they swapped placed with those on the ship.

The ship’s commanding officer, Navy Capt. Brett Crozier, wrote a memo to Navy officials and requested help to evacuate the sailors from the ship. Then acting Navy secretary, Thomas Modly, removed Crozier from command after the memo was leaked.

Modly eventually had to resign after his address to the ship’s crew in which he accused Crozier of either leaking the memo or being “too naive or too stupid to be the commanding officer of a ship like this,” according to The Washington Post.

The Navy reviewed Crozier’s removal and upheld the dismissal in June, saying he did not do enough, soon enough to prevent the spread of the virus. The Navy also decided to postpone the promotion of Rear Adm. Stuart Baker, who was aboard the Roosevelt at the time, to a two-star admiral.

The USS Theodore Roosevelt left Guam 55 days after the March 27 docking, and conducted basic drills in the Philippine Sea. It has been deployed in the Pacific in recent weeks and even conducted dual-carrier exercises with the USS Nimitz a week ago.