SAN DIEGO (KGTV) — An internal Navy investigation concluded that someone deliberately deleted key GPS evidence from three boats after a mishap on San Diego Bay sent five sailors to the hospital, new documents obtained by Team 10 reveal.
The documents were written last July and sent to the commanding officer of the Naval Special Warfare Group One Logistics Support Unit following the June 2023 crash.
The mishap occurred just before 2 a.m., when a rigid-hull inflatable boat (RHIB) hit the Zuniga Jetty at the mouth of the bay while returning to Coronado.
At the time, the military said a Naval Special Warfare unit was conducting routine training operations off the coast and a Navy SEAL was among the five injured.
The crash was so violent that one sailor hit the water face down and was knocked unconscious. A teammate, now hailed a hero, quickly jumped in to save his life.
“This was a very routine mission, but as all SEALs know, it's a lot of times the routine stuff that ends up getting you,” said Jake Zweig, a former Navy SEAL who now works as an executive coach in San Antonio.
The Navy didn’t release any other details about the accident, so Team 10 filed a Freedom of Information Act request. After nearly two years, we finally obtained the 91-page investigation.
It says three RHIBs were involved in the training and reveals a troubling finding. Track lines, the GPS breadcrumbs that show exactly where each boat went, were “deliberately” deleted from all three boats after the crash.
This raised eyebrows after investigators confirmed boats back on base still had their track lines.
“My guess is one of them was trying to make sure that they didn't get their butt burned off for this accident,” said Zweig, who’s trained on RHIBs.
The investigation put the blame for the accident on the coxswain, the sailor in charge of steering the boat. He was the only service member to receive a non-judicial punishment.
SEAL Team 1 attended safety brief
He lacked experience in nighttime operations, according to the Navy, which found he was “derelict in his duties” by not adhering to the rules of the road, basic navigation, GPS, and radar operation at night.
Zweig, who has taken part in the same maritime interdiction operations training the sailors were doing, said he wasn’t surprised the Navy’s investigation says everyone interviewed after the crash denied deleting the GPS track lines.
“SEALS are gonna cover their butts. Probably the hardest community in the world to do an investigation on. You know, it's closed. It's a closed community. They're not opening it up.”
Even though SEAL Team 1 is mentioned several times in the investigation obtained by Team 10, the Navy now says no SEALs were on the boats or involved in the mishap.
That statement surprised us because, according to the report we obtained, members from SEAL Team 1 (ST-1) attended a safety brief on the day of the accident.
Sailors were to move a special boat team through San Diego Bay and meet at a buoy.
The report states, “ST-1 MIO (Maritime Interdiction Operations) training occurred onboard the target vessel.”
But now despite the Navy’s initial statements that a SEAL was injured, a Naval Special Warfare Command spokesperson says that was wrong.
Capt. Jodie Cornell told Team 10 the crash involved support personnel to training and said, “NO SEALs were on the boats or involved,” in an email.
Yet legal paperwork signed by sailors involved in the crash clearly list SEAL Team 1 as their unit and activity.
The documents we’ve obtained also show that after the mishap, interviews were done at the SEAL Team 1 office.
'Rushing to get home'
That’s where the sailor found responsible for the crash, admitted a motion sickness medication he took “made me a little drowsy.”
As for other factors that contributed to the accident, an investigator concluded the sailor was “rushing to get home” and had been operating at “a dangerously high rate of speed.”
The investigation found night-vision goggles required for the mission were never handed out, visibility was a challenge and two of the five lights on the jetty were inoperable.
Zweig said the crash is a reminder of how dangerous training can be for elite military units like the Navy SEALs.
Policy changes made
“Everything we do in the SEAL teams is level five training; death is imminent. All we're trying to do is mitigate the death and make sure we keep it as safe as possible.”
Team 10 asked the Navy if it ever got to the bottom of who deleted the track lines.
Capt. Cornell didn’t answer the question in a prepared statement but said following the mishap, a series of enhancements were made to operational protocols.
“This incident prompted a thorough review of procedures across Naval Special Warfare Command and the US Navy, leading to policy changes designed to enhance training and reinforce operational safety,” she said.
The Navy’s investigation ended with seven recommendations being made, including one clear directive: GPS track lines should never be deleted.
Investigative Reporter Austin Grabish covers military investigations, the U.S.–Mexico border and the Medical Board of California. If you have a story for Austin to investigate, email austin.grabish@10news.com
