Last week, a fire broke out in the main laundry area aboard the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford. At the time, U.S. Central Command put out a statement claiming that only two sailors suffered minor injuries and that the fire had no operational impact. Unnamed sources aboard the ship, however, told the New York Times that the fire took 30 hours to put out, that dozens of sailors suffered from smoke inhalation, and 600 sailors were left without bunks. “And in the category of non-life-threatening, but still not ideal, many sailors have not been able to do laundry since the fire,” the Times reports.
The laundry problem comes on top of the now-famous toilet issue. The nuclear plant and flight deck may be unaffected by all this, but the crew are getting increasingly tired and uncomfortable, a condition which is not conducive to accident-free operations. The ship has been at sea for 266 days as of March 17, and may be out for a couple of months longer. According to the USNI Fleet and Marine Tracker, the Ford is currently in the Red Sea.
