Rescue Operation on Missing USS John McCain Sailors

The recent incident involving USS John S. McCain in the waters off Pulau Batu Putih (also known as Pedra Branca by Singapore) underscores the dangers faced by navies and merchants alike.

The collision to my knowledge is the second involving navies and merchant vessels in the area.

The first involved Republic of Singapore Navy ship RSS Courageous (pennant number 96) on 3 January 2003 resulted in the deaths of 4 female personnel when their quarters were sheared off the unfortunate ship. 1 personnel, Cpl Goh Hui Ling remains missing.

Location where RSS Courageous incident occurred is very near to where USS John S. McCain had been struck.

Soon after the early morning collision, USS John S. McCain personnel had immediately performed recovery operations in which they had noted 10 personnel were missing. 

USS John S. McCain after the collision. Source - online

A distress message was sent, and RMN KD Handalan was the first ship to arrive in the area to provide assistance. KD Handalan was the nearest ship and was only 3 nautical miles away when the incident occurred.

KD Handalan (Pennant No 3511)
Source KD Handalan 

While the ship returned to Singapore (he ship is based in Singapore), rescue operations were mounted by RSN within their territorial waters, including the disputed island of Pulau Batu Putih.

Malaysia too launched a concurrent operations in the waters within our control. The location of the incident is within the Malaysian Maritime Search and Rescue Region.

The operation involved several agencies; Royal Malaysian Navy and Agensi Penguatkuasa Maritim Malaysia (APMM).
Lead agency for the operation is APMM (operation is still ongoing at the time of writing).

Similarly, Indonesian authorities also launched search and rescue operations within their territorial waters near Natuna islands.

Some of the Malaysian vessels involved in the operations are KD Lekiu and KD Gempita. Names of other ships and units can be seen from the following maps.

The coordinated operations by Malaysian agencies led to the discovery of a body on . However, later it was established that the body was not one of the sailors involved in the collision.

Despite Malaysian agencies already on the ground conducting search and rescue operations within our territorial waters, while respecting International Court of Justice rule on Pulau Batu Putih, it was very unfortunate that Singaporean authority involved in the operations had downplayed Malaysian involvement in this rescue operations.

In fact, sources involved in this operation had informed that Singapore had tried to boss around the rescue operations and had tried to enter Malaysian territorial waters, disrespecting our territorial sovereignty.

Singaporean authority had also included Malaysian territorial waters into their operational plan. This unilateral decision by Singaporean authority will only spark further confusion and precious time will be wasted to clear up this mistake by Singaporean authority which should had been spent searching for the missing sailors more effectively.

Search area within Malaysian territorial waters.

This kiasuness has to stop.

It is disappointing to see them trying to claim credit over the whole operation when reality is a joint operations between the interested parties.

It is also disappointing to note that some Malaysian netizens choose to question Malaysian involvement in this rescue operation and linking this to the failure to find MH370.

Correcting this misperception is very important as not only it portrays that Malaysian authorities are ineffective within our own waters, but also it creates an illusion that we need Singapore to take care of our own waters.

This will not augur well when there is a territorial dispute between both nations.

Such misperception may result in Singapore being implied as effectively exercising control authority over our territorial waters despite not being the case.

Singaporean authority and media should know better to report the incident as it is.

Setting that aside, what matter more now is the recovery of the 8 sailors still missing (2 had been recovered on board in the flooded quarters).

Latest update:
All 10 bodies had been recovered in the flooded quarters on board of USS John S. McCain.