Then two explosions erupted under the port rudder and near the starboard bow and everyone went to general quarters on a cruiser dead in the water.

Three sailors were wounded. Damage control teams rushed to contain the deluge from internal pipes that broke open. A cut in power stopped the air conditioning, which knocked out the Aegis radar and Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles, leaving the mighty warship defenseless.

Lt. Michael Martin Gilday was the tactical action officer on a vessel that struck two of the 1,000 mines strung in an underwater arc stretching 150 miles, from the Persian Gulf’s Faylaka Island to the Saudi border, officials later determined.

But 15 minutes after the detonations, Gilday and his crew had restored the TLAM and Aegis systems and returned the Princeton to its place as the flotilla’s anti-air ringleader.

And they remained at their battle stations for another harrowing 30 hours until the wounded warship could be towed out of the minefield, according to the citation attached to his 1991 Navy Commendation Medal with Valor device, which notes his courageous leadership.

“He was responsible for our command and control of our communications with the rest of the world, as well as the security of the combat systems,” said retired Capt. Edward B. “Ted” Hontz, the commander of the Princeton during Operation Desert Storm.

“He was a wartime guy and did a superb job,”

Gilday “took care of his job,” Hontz continued. “He took care of his people, extremely professional. He was a calm, cool customer, and at the time — in my opinion as an officer at the end of my career — was … as cool a character as you can get, he’s so good.”

Hontz pegged Gilday as a future three-star but conceded “it appears he’s going to exceed my hopes.”

On Aug. 1, the U.S. Senate unanimously confirmed Gilday as the 32nd chief of naval operations and granted him a fourth star.

He’d been deep-selected from the ranks of vice admirals, a promotion unseen since 1970 but one that surprised few of those who’ve watched him rise from a lowly U.S. Naval Academy plebe 38 years ago.

“The most important thing is, if there’s there’s an officer who walks on water, who’s a superstar, usually there’s an element of ego that goes along with that. And you never got that from Mike,” said Joe Wright, an Academy classmate and the navigator of the Princeton off the coast of Kuwait.

And he has a story about Gilday’s valor award, too.

“So we were in the CO’s cabin,” Wright recalled. “This was after everything that happened. And we’re in dry dock in Dubai. And I happen to notice, there was a clipboard with a list of names and proposed decorations for people. And I saw it was there. Then I saw Mike pick it up and crossed off his own name.

“And I don’t think he knew that I saw him do that.”

Bad Santa

Gilday, 56, never could have anticipated his rapid elevation to replace Adm. John Richardson, who is retiring as the sea service’s top officer.

A change of command ceremony had been planned for Aug. 1 in Annapolis, with former Vice Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Bill Moran fleeting up to become CNO.

Confirmed without a whiff of scandal by the Senate, Moran was derailed by reports of an ongoing Pentagon probe into emails he allegedly exchanged with his former spokesman, Chris Servello.

Although he was never charged with a crime and has long professed his innocence, Servello’s own career foundered in late 2016 after he was accused of sexually-tinged shenanigans while dressed as Santa Claus at a boozy Pentagon holiday party.

A surprise July 7 announcement by Secretary of the Navy Richard V. Spencer axed Moran’s promotion and began a process to find his replacement.

Spencer told Navy Times that he and CNO Richardson didn’t want to dragoon one of the Navy’s eight four-stars on active duty, believing that they held critical billets overseas and at home and couldn’t be replaced.

Spencer believed there was “a pretty good bench” of vice admirals but Gilday — the director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff for a year — “started shining like a diamond.”

Spencer was drawn to the four years Gilday spent at Cyber Command inside Maryland’s Fort Meade before he went to the Pentagon. He wanted to find someone with an acute knowledge of cyberwarfare as his next CNO.

But first he had to canvass the opinions of former SECNAVs and CNOs about Gilday. When they heartily endorsed the vice admiral, Spencer began talking to four-stars outside the sea service, too.

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Marine Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr., told him, “I’d never let him go for any other opportunity but to help the Navy in the position of CNO,” Spencer recollected.

Gen. David L. Goldfein, the Air Force’s chief of staff, strongly supported Gilday’s promotion and so did his counterpart in the Army, Mark A. Milley, who was soon to be confirmed as Dunford’s replacement.

“All the marks came back A+,” Spencer said.

But in the back of his mind, Spencer still struggled with deep-selecting a three-star for CNO, something that hadn’t been done since Secretary of the Navy John Chafee and President Richard Nixon recalled Vice Adm. Elmo “Bud” Zumwalt Jr. from Vietnam to serve as the top naval officer.

Zumwalt leaped over 33 more senior officers but proved Chafee right. Today he’s remembered as one of the most inspiring and innovative CNOs to have held the post.

A Marine Corps veteran, Spencer told Navy Times that he couldn’t be blind to naval history and tradition, and choosing Gilday became a “weighty” decision “because this was a significant movement.”

Convinced that Gilday was the best officer for the job, he took his proposal to the Pentagon and the Oval Office.

He said that President Donald J. Trump also understood the historical moment and wanted consensus from his military leaders that this three-star was the right person.

The president said, “Got it. Understood,” Spencer recalled.

They had their nominee.

Historical moment

Retired Adm. Jim Stavridis was NATO commander when then-Rear Adm. Gilday served on the staff of the Allied Joint Force in Lisbon.

A student of history, Stavridis isn’t surprised by Spencer’s decision to elevate Gilday because he sees signs of both Zumwalt and Arleigh Burke in the new CNO’s career.

Dwight D. Eisenhower promoted Rear Adm. Arleigh Burke over 92 flag officers to become his CNO in 1955.

“He has the innovation credentials of Zumwalt in his work as 10th Fleet commander on cyber, especially in harnessing it for offensive operations. His distinguished destroyer background is reminiscent of Arleigh Burke,” said Stavridis.

Before he commanded Carrier Strike Group 8, Gilday led Destroyer Squadron 7 and the Arleigh Burke-class destroyers Benfold and Higgins.

“But ultimately, he is his own distinct leader, and his defining quality is humility. Quiet, thoughtful, kind, and blessed with a self-deprecating sense of humor, he leads without ego or hubris. He is a perfect choice as CNO for today’s Navy,” Stavridis said.

Son of a sailor

That self-deprecation might stem from his blue collar roots, sailors and officers told Navy Times.

Gilday is the son of a sailor, and he grew up in an Irish Catholic family of five in Lowell, Massachusetts, according to his Naval Academy yearbook.

In Annapolis, he was known as “Crash” or “Squire Mike,” the sort of midshipman who drank 10,000 cups of coffee and dipped a thousand cans of Copenhagen before he graduated.

And graduation in 1985 didn’t always seem a likely outcome.

The yearbook notes that he was sent to “ac-board,” an academic program to shore up substandard performance, before he put it all together and stitched on three stripes as the regimental adjutant — a top leadership post for midshipmen — and made the superintendent’s list of top performers.

“He probably wasn’t the smartest of the guys in our company but by any measure he was probably the hardest working of all of us put together,” said classmate Dan Holzrichter, who commissioned as a Marine.

“He was a very intense person, too, whether it was studying or playing ultimate frisbee. Whatever he did, he brought that intensity to it.”

Along with the intensity came attention to detail.

“You would open up his medicine cabinet and everything would be lined up, from smallest to largest. So if you wanted to mess with him, you’d move things around,” Holzrichter said.

In the fleet

All the traits that made Gilday a successful midshipman followed him to the fleet after he commissioned as a surface warfare officer.

Three years behind him at the Academy, Jerry Dickerson was a lieutenant junior grade serving as the officer of the deck when Princeton detonated the two manta mines in 1991. When they went to general quarters, he reported to Gilday inside the Combat Information Center — the electronic nerve center of the warship — and watched his leadership under pressure.

“He always led by example, from out front, and there was no tolerance for us not performing at a very high level. It was very clear all the time, I felt, that I was being led by Mike Gilday. But his leadership wasn’t in a dictatorial way. It was kind of a ‘I’m going to lead from out front and you guys better keep up with me’ kind of style,” Dickerson recalled.

By the time Gilday rose to executive officer on the sister Ticonderoga-class cruiser Gettysburg, he’d evolved into a highly intelligent and inspiring leader, retired Rear Adm. Jacob Shuford, the warship’s former CO, recalled.

Shuford commanded three vessels and a strike group and never met a better XO or chief of staff.

“He’s really an extraordinary person,” Shuford said. “He’s smart as a whip, really knows the Navy and has a strong set of values he’s developed in his life. You put someone like that in any job and they’re going to be great. And, of course, he would be the last to toot his own horn. In fact, he doesn’t do it at all. That’s Michael Gilday.”

Sailors who served below Gilday told Navy Times the same thing.

“I was simply not surprised to hear that he had been selected as a three-star to be CNO,” said retired Command Master Chief Michael DiBiccaro, his top enlisted adviser on the destroyers Higgins and Benfold.

“When we worked together years ago, I knew he was going places. You can see the impression he makes on people. You just can’t fake that.”

DiBiccaro recollected that Gilday hated pomp, a departure from a previous CO whose movements through a warship could be traced by all the sailors shouting “Attention on deck!” or “Gangway!”

Under Gilday, they only announced his arrival during special events, like award ceremonies. DiBiccaro said that he didn’t want to interrupt sailors at work.

In 18 months under his command, he can’t remember the officer ever raising his voice — because he never needed to do it.

Gilday confided to his command master chief that he understood the importance of maintaining discipline, but the one job he truly hated was holding Captain’s Mast. After doling out the punishment, he privately worked with his enlisted leaders to “get this sailor back on board.”

“And even for those sailors who did something that required us to send them home, he’d tell me ‘I know that has to happen, we can’t have that in the Navy, so we punish the sailor. But let’s make sure we take care of the human being on their way out,’” DiBiccaro said.

“I’ve worked with some great officers, officers that have gone on to become admirals and command ships, and all those things,” DiBiccaro continued. “I knew when I left that ship, that he was finest naval officer I’ve ever served with. I have never met a sailor, officer or enlisted, that did not respect him and did not love him.”

For the six years between 2009 and 2015, Juan M. Garcia III was the assistant secretary of the Navy for manpower and reserve affairs — as well as a retired Navy Reserve captain.

Working with several Navy chiefs of personnel trying to create fitness policy, he saw a sea service wrestling with ways to build a true “culture of fitness” and thinks technology might offer some solutions.

“The idea would be a shift from this twice-a-year crucible, with all the attendant dangers that go with that,” Garcia told Navy Times. “We shift to a year-round culture of fitness using analytics to determine a sailor’s fitness level.”

Garcia’s concerned that today’s fitness tests have created their own culture by prodding sailors to take drastic measures such as “binge dieting, and folks getting into wraps and even surgeries to try to get through” the Navy’s body composition assessment.

He fears too many sailors tough out their tests despite little or no preparation, what’s often termed in the fleet as the “3-mile-a-year program.”

Wearable technology changes that because the Navy can track almost any fitness activity by measuring resting heart beats. Sailors can choose how they exercise and if the analytics match the standards set by the sea service, they’re good to go.

“Pick whatever works for you, whatever motivates them the most,” Garcia said. “Are you a weightlifter, a swimmer, a hiker, or is your thing yoga?”

“At the end of the day, the device spits out what the docs call ‘VO2 max lung capacity,’” he continued. “It’s considered the gold standard in determining cardio-vascular strength and endurance.”

That was the Air Force’s primary fitness measurement in the 1990s, he said. Airmen would mount a stationary bike, strap on an oxygen mask and a doctor would monitor the tests that measured their lung capacity.

“They loved it,” Garcia said. “They felt like it was the ground truth about the fitness level of their folks.”

But after the tempo of operations skyrocketed in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist bombings, the Air Force found it increasingly difficult to administer a cumbersome test that required extra manpower and hardware, so Garcia said “they turned it off” and returned to traditional fitness exams.

To Garcia, today’s wearable devices can do the same jobs that “a bike, a hose and a doc” did for the Air Force.

Sailors can download their data to their command fitness leaders at regular intervals and the service can determine if they’re in good shape or need some help.

“You’d constantly know right where you stand with your fitness,” Garcia said.

Wearable devices got a rocky start in the military as the fitness fad took off nationwide — not because they didn’t work, but because many of the gadgets tracked the location of those wearing them, sometimes outing clandestine sites on the globe.

Garcia said those functions can be turned off before anyone unwittingly violates OPSEC. He wants the Navy to consider a wearable tech test run for young men and women in the delayed entry program, before they ship to Recruit Training Command.

“Once they raise their hand, why not have the first piece of Navy gear they’re issued be wearable fitness technology? The recruiters can track their fitness and determine if they are, in fact, ready and in shape enough to head off to boot camp,” he said.

The Navy conducted a tiny test of wearable fitness technology in 2015. That was an effort to encourage “year-round fitness awareness” among sailors by measuring their physical activity and allowing them to set goals.

But that project was limited. As with a similar Army initiative, officials didn’t download the data to a central location, something a new effort targeting future recruits could change, Garcia said.

Garcia believes that many of today’s recruits aren’t as fit as those from previous generations, but he admires their determination to serve.

“We’ve got to give them the tools and help them build their fitness while they’re waiting to ship,” he said. “What I love about the analytics is it now allows the recruiter to definitively and objectively say, ‘Hey, you’re ready to ship to Great Lakes.’”

And he worries the brass are breaking the law to put him behind bars while the real culprit who spoofed a SEAL goes free.

An explosives expert lauded for taking out terrorist supply routes and safe houses in internal SEAL records provided to Navy Times, Special Warfare Operator 1st Class Aaron Howard faces a court-martial trial for allegedly posing as a pair of people who wooed three women through text messages into sending racy images of themselves in 2017.

The victims are an aircrew survival equipmentman second class and two civilians, military prosecutors say.

All the charges fall under Article 134 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which prohibits actions that can ruin good order and discipline in a unit or those that bring discredit upon the armed forces.

A member of Virginia-based SEAL Team 6 since 2014 and its Sailor of the Year two years later, the highly-decorated Howard’s medals include a Bronze Star with a Valor device denoting battlefield heroism inside an undisclosed nation, according to records provided to Navy Times.

During one of dozens of targeted raids deep behind enemy lines to snatch guerrilla leaders, on Sept. 29, 2016 he selflessly exposed himself to withering small arms fire so that his team could remove “two critically wounded surrogate force teammates,” according to the medal’s citation.

But now he risks brig time, demotion and an unwanted exit from the military.

Navy Region Mid-Atlantic spokesman Jeff Hood said SO1 Howard waived his Article 32 hearing and has been arraigned but has yet to enter a plea and no date for his court-martial trial at Naval Base Norfolk has been set.

The sexy snapshot scandal is the latest imbroglio to embarrass the SEALs, the elite special operators once lauded as “silent professionals” who eschewed the sort of shenanigans that snagged headlines.

But on Wednesday, Special Operations Command announced military leaders had booted from Iraq a Coronado, California-based SEAL Team 7 platoon following allegations they were tied to a booze-fueled July 4th party.

During the probe into the illegal celebration, Air Force authorities also began a separate inquiry into sexual assault allegations involving a SEAL leader there and a female service member, but officials insist it was the drinking that triggered their return to Coronado.

Although he was exonerated of all war crimes charges by a panel of his peers, the recent court-martial trial of Special Warfare Operator Chief Edward “Eddie” Gallagher in San Diego included witnesses testifying about a similar cowboy culture inside another SEAL Team 7 platoon, with their 2017 deployment to Iraq punctuated by heavy drinking on the battlefield and unlawful photos of service members mugging with dead bodies.

But the Gallagher trial and the ongoing prosecutor of his platoon’s commanding officer, Navy Lt. Jacob X. “Jake” Portier, also revealed allegations of heavy-handed SEAL leaders who engaged in unlawful command influence to scuttle the SEALs’ chances of getting a fair trial.

The military judge hearing the case ended up sanctioning Navy prosecutors for a warrantless spying operation run by counterintelligence agents at Naval Criminal Investigative Service that targeted defense attorneys and the editor of Navy Times.

Currently languishing in legal limbo at Naval Special Warfare Development Group, Howard now spends his days performing menial chores such as painting buildings instead of hunting terrorists.

He and his attorney— Michael Waddington — say they have no idea how DEVGRU leaders came to suspect him as the catfisher.

According to legal filings in the case, the Navy began probing the spoofing and sexting allegations in late 2017 but Howard quickly took and passed a pair of polygraph tests, something Gallagher did, too.

Also like Gallagher, Howard insists that he’s innocent. And in a series of legal filings his attorney Waddington accuses SEAL commanders of wielding unlawful command influence to overcome a shoddy investigation.

Called the “mortal enemy of military justice,” unlawful command influence, or UCI, occurs when superiors utter words or take actions that wrongfully influence the outcome of court-martial cases, jeopardize the appellate process or undermine the public’s confidence in the armed forces by appearing to tip the scales of justice.

And to Waddington, SEAL Team 6′s UCI problems began shortly after Howard hired him.

In a July 25 motion he filed with the military court here, Waddington wrote that in early 2018 Command Master Chief Eric Adamski and Master Chief Special Warfare Operator Scotty Walker convened a meeting with Howard to tell him that he was “guilty for getting a lawyer” and was an “(expletive) idiot” who “cannot be trusted” and “(expletived) himself because he sought legal counsel.”

When Howard tried to find witnesses who would back him up or swear to his good character, DEVGRU leaders verbally, through electronic communications and on the command’s work portal page warned them away from him, Waddington wrote.

In April of 2018, enlisted leaders held an all hands meeting with Blue Squadron SEALs to dish on Howard’s investigation, telling them that he “was guilty and SEALs should not help with his case,” according to the motion.

DEVGRU’s command then held another briefing detailing what they say were their initial investigative findings and gave a PowerPoint presentation that implied Howard “was guilty of various offenses,” Waddington wrote.

They then emailed the presentation to Howard’s fellow SEALs, his superiors and “potential fact and sentencing witnesses,” which is why they’ve “shunned him and refused to participate in his case, in any manner,” including assisting the defense team in their investigation, Waddington continued.

Nine days ago, Waddington filed another motion to compel SEAL Team 6 leaders to fork over the PowerPoint slides, emails and other records, but the Navy has yet to provide them.

So Howard’s defense team is left only with the command’s investigation.

In the legal filings uncovered by Navy Times, it’s unclear if NCIS or any other law enforcement agency participated in the SEAL Team 6 probe.

“NCIS declined to take the lead in this investigation,” Waddington said. “That pretty much left it up to the command.”

Saying all the evidence against Howard is “circumstantial,” the attorney told Navy Times that the command seemed to suspect Howard because some of the texts to the women mentioned being stationed once in San Diego, but “that could be 50 percent of all SEALs.”

There’s also a comment alluding to working out with kettle bells, but that’s not unique to any SEAL, Waddington added.

“In one text, the spoofer made comments about liking baseball,” Waddington said. “And they assumed because my client was a high school athlete that he played baseball. He didn’t. He played football.”

Howard offered his phone for forensic investigators to comb over, but Waddington said the command declined.

Reached in Coronado, Naval Special Warfare spokeswoman Cmdr. Tamara Lawrence said it would be inappropriate to comment about an ongoing court-martial case but leaders expect all sailors “to uphold the highest ethical and professional standards.”

And all misconduct allegations “will be investigated by the appropriate authorities,” she added.

Currently assigned to the Naval Base San Diego-based mine countermeasures ship Champion, Information Systems Technician 3rd Class Daniel van Dijk imported hundreds of grams of the mood-altering stimulant ecstasy “at or near Queens, New York,” through multiple transactions between Nov. 22 and Dec. 3, military prosecutors wrote.

On Nov. 26, 2018, he allegedly bought 174 grams of ecstasy online and had it shipped to his mailbox on Naval Base San Diego “with intent to distribute” the controlled substance, his charge sheets state.

On Nov. 30 in San Diego, he allegedly possessed another 152 grams of ecstasy and 93 “squares of LSD” to distribute.

On the same day, he allegedly put 15 grams of ecstasy into “capsule form” for the same scheme, according to the legal filings.

On Dec. 3, he allegedly brought another 58 grams of ecstasy to the base for distribution, prosecutors wrote.

Authorities so far have named only one suspected drug deal ― an Oct. 26 incident in which he allegedly sought to “wrongfully distribute some amount” of ecstasy at or near San Diego.

Van Dijk’s court-martial trial is slated to kick off on Oct. 21, according to Navy Region Southwest spokesman Kevin Dixon.

If found guilty on a single charge of wrongful possession with the intent to distribute, he faces a dishonorable discharge, forfeiture of all pay and allowances and up to 15 years behind bars.

Through a public affairs officer, van Dijk’s military attorneys declined comment “at this time.”

According to his military records, van Dijk enlisted on Dec. 15, 2016 and later trained at Information Warfare Training Command Corry Station in Pensacola, Florida.

Originally from New Jersey, he reported to the Champion in late 2017 and became a petty officer on June 16, 2018.

He’s authorized to wear two Navy “E” ribbons and the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, according to his military records.

The warship traveled roughly 20,000 miles after leaving Rota on March 23 on its sixth forward deployed patrol since joining the 6th Fleet in 2015.

“The men and women of the Carney crew performed admirably,” said the destroyer’s commanding officer, Cmdr. Tyson Young, in a prepared statement released by 6th Fleet.

“We are all very excited to get back home and enjoy some well-deserved leave time.”

Carney’s most recent patrol took the warship to three major exercises in the region, spanning nearly the entire width of 6th Fleet’s operational area, from the Atlantic Ocean to the Black Sea.

In late March and early April, Carney joined 34 other surface ships, five submarines and 59 aircraft from 13 nations in the Joint Warrior exercise, which focuses on anti-piracy and counter-terrorism training, plus crisis simulations.

During May’s exercise Formidable Shield, held on the United Kingdom’s Hebrides Range off the Western Scottish Isles, Carney conducted missile defense training alongside warships from eight other NATO members.

In late June Carney participated in the 12-day Sea Breeze exercise in the northwestern part of Black Sea. The surface warfare and anti-submarine training involved 30 ships and 30 aircraft from 19 countries, often monitored by Russian forces.

Carney is slated to be replaced in Rota by the Naval Station Mayport-based guided-missile destroyer Roosevelt in mid-2020. Carney is expected to return to the Florida homeport before undergoing a long overhaul and modernization session in a shipyard.

The spotlight now falls on an “Advancement-to-Position” senior enlisted selection board slated to convene on Sept. 9 in Millington, Tennessee, according to a statement sent to Navy Times.

The board will offer up to 42 goat locker jobs to senior enlisted leaders ready and able to take on billets that traditionally are difficult to fill.

That doubles the number of slots offered last year.

The bulk of the board’s billets — 33 spot advancements — are earmarked for chief petty officers in 11 different ratings, enlisted leaders the Navy deems ready to fill senior chief jobs across the fleet.

And nine eligible senior chiefs will get the opportunity to advance to the grade of master chief in eight different ratings.

“While the Navy may have enough senior enlisted leaders, they are not in the places the Navy needs them, leading sailors at sea” said Cmdr. Chris Stillion, the Shore Allocations officer in the Career Management Department at Navy Personnel Command, in the release.

The Navy began experimenting with “Advancement-to-Position” last summer by filling 19 critical fleet E-9 billets from a pool of 91 senior chiefs who applied to the board.

Officials cited the success of the initiative last month before they announced offering E-6 crows to capable second class petty officers ready and willing to recruit or train the Navy’s newest sailors.

This year, Navy leaders rolled out a key reform: Candidates for advancement get a more detailed look at the available assignments and their duty locations before they apply.

A complete list of the offered jobs is available here.

The Navy wants to fix a problem many enlisted sailors face. When they advance, they’re not always able to get orders quickly for billets that better fit their new grades and skills.

That means senior enlisted leaders who “are not aligned to the billets the Navy needs them to fill,” something the board wants to help remedy, Stillion said.

But interested sailors must act quickly. Applications must be submitted electronically or postmarked by Aug. 7.

Officials hope to cut them orders to their new commands and pin on the new anchors within two months of their selections.

The advancements are considered temporary. To make them permanent, selected sailors must be greenlighted by the regularly scheduled senior or master chief selection boards next year.

Those who don’t get the nod or fail to finish their tours will revert back to their previous grades.

For more information on the program, go here.

Saldana was first reported missing at about 6:30 a.m. local time, prompting the carrier to call a man overboard event in an initial attempt to locate him.

When attempts to find him on board failed, it was assumed he’d gone overboard.

A search at sea was started involving the carrier Lincoln along with the guided-missile cruiser Leyte Gulf, Patrol Squadrons 10 and 40 and the Spanish guided-missile frigate Méndez Núñez.

The search was called off two days later and the Navy continues to list the sailor as “Duty Status Whereabouts Unknown.”

Saldana is assigned to Lincoln’s embarked Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 5.

Saldana reported to the Norfolk-based Nightdippers on Sept. 19, according to his military records.

A native of Manassas, Virginia, he joined the Navy on April 8, 2015.

Initially in training for three months as a nuclear power sailor, Saldana switched to the aviation field and was assigned to the amphibious assault ship Iwo Jima in late 2015. He spent roughly three years on the Naval Station Mayport-based ship.

He reported to HSC-5 after completing advanced training in helicopter maintenance at the Naval Aviation Technical Training Unit in Norfolk last summer.

A U.S. Navy EP-3 Aries II reconnaissance aircraft, was approached in an “unprofessional manner” by a Venezuelan SU-30 Flanker-C fighter aircraft in “approved international airspace” on Friday according to a U.S. Southern Command statement released Sunday.

“After reviewing video documentation, we have determined the Russian-made fighter aggressively shadowed the EP-3 at an unsafe distance in international airspace for a prolonged period of time, endangering the safety of the crew and jeopardizing the EP-3 mission,” the release said.

The U.S. aircraft “was performing a multi-nationally recognized & approved mission in international airspace over #CaribbeanSea,” Southern Command tweeted earlier today.

The Venezuelan fighter “took off from an airfield 200 miles east of Caracas,” but the release didn’t specify how long the intercept lasted.

The United States, allies and regional partners routinely patrol the Caribbean Sea with ships and aircraft on counter-drug missions. Intercepts of U.S. aircraft have happened more frequently overseas near Russia and China, and are relatively uncommon so close to the U.S. homeland.

Southern Command did not detail if this EP-3 Aries was looking for drug smugglers or if its purpose was to monitor Venezuela while tensions with the regime of embattled President Nicolás Maduro continue to simmer.

The Maduro “regime continues to undermine internationally recognized laws and demonstrate its contempt for international agreements” and its “unprovoked and unjustified acts” are undermining the ability of “the U.S. and other nations to safely conduct flights in international airspace,” Southern Command stated.

Southern Command’s release also took a swipe at Russia, which has continued supporting Maduro despite National Assembly President Juan Guaidó declaration in January that he’s the South American country’s legitimate leader.

In the past months, most governments in the Western Hemisphere, including the United States, have recognized Guaidó’s rule.

Maduro continues to draw support from nations such as Cuba, China and Russia.

As recently as last month, Russia buzzed a U.S. P-8A Poseidon over the Mediterranean in a similar incident.

“This latest action also demonstrates Russia’s irresponsible military support to the illegitimate Maduro regime and adds to Maduro’s growing legacy of reckless and negligent behavior, which undermines international rule of law and efforts to counter illicit trafficking.” Southern Command’s release said.

But Aviation Boatswain’s Mate (Fuels) Airman Uriel Gerardo-Olivas also told the judge that she wasn’t even his final target.

He wanted her dead to collect the $100,000 government life insurance payout and spend it on another hit to slay a superior on the carrier he said bullied him and other junior sailors.

And his estranged wife heard it all inside the courtroom here.

“I intended to kill my wife,” said Gerardo-Olivas, 25. “I was wrong for what I did. I hope that one day she can forgive me and, if not, I understand.”

As part of his pretrial agreement, the lanky sailor from Hillsboro, Oregon, admitted to one specification of attempted murder and prosecutors dropped four other charges — aggravated assault, communicating a threat, abusing marijuana and larceny.

Judge Cmdr. Hayes C. Larsen sentenced Gerardo-Olivas to 25 years in prison, reduction to E-1 and a dishonorable discharge. But 15 years of the sentence will be suspended if Gerardo-Olivas follows the terms of the agreement.

Without the plea deal, the sailor risked a life sentence without the chance for parole.

Because he had accrued 378 days in pretrial confinement, he’ll serve less than nine more years behind bars.

During the sentencing phase of the trial, prosecutor Lt. Michaela Reardon called Gerardo-Olivas “cold blooded“ and “a danger to society” who had plotted two brutal murders.

But his civilian defense attorney, Noah Weisberg, painted a portrait of a man forced into desperate measures by an unidentified electrician’s mate first class on board the Bush who tormented the airman and caused his promising Navy career to unravel.

Weisberg said that Gerardo-Olivas joined the Navy on Sept. 11, 2013, to serve his country and appeared to be a model sailor, excelling in boot camp and graduating at the top of his “A” school class of 50.

Weisberg pointed to evaluations after he reported to the Bush in early 2014 that described Gerardo-Olivas as “outstanding and dependable,” a sailor with “unlimited potential.” The attorney said that began to change a year later, when the petty officer allegedly began physically and mentally abusing him and other junior shipmates.

Gerardo-Olivas testified that he and two other airmen took their complaints up the chain of command, but Navy leaders sided with the petty officer.

“No one would ever believe an airman,” he said. “What I said didn’t matter.”

Gerardo-Olivas told the judge that for the next 2 1/2 years he endured almost daily abuse from the more senior sailor.

At the same time, Gerardo-Olivas started dating the woman who would become his wife.

She told the judge that she fell in love with Gerardo-Olivas, who wooed her with flowers, but over time their relationship degenerated into “my absolute nightmare.”

Navy Times does not identify victims of domestic abuse.

She described his frequent infidelities and their inevitable reconciliations, a cycle that repeated itself “over and over again.”

While he stayed in Norfolk, she continued to reside in Washington and work as a flight attendant. They never lived together for long stretches of time, she said.

Despite his string of other women, they agreed to marry in early 2017.

It was a stressful, yo-yo romance, she said, and she later demanded a divorce.

In the meantime, Gerardo-Olivas had picked up with another woman.

He told the judge that the petty officer who constantly bullied him threatened to “kill me, my girlfriend and daughter” in early 2018.

Gerardo-Olivas said that he began sleeping with a gun. He contemplated suicide but finally decided that the first class “had to be stopped” and he wanted the petty officer’s life to end violently.

But he couldn’t stomach the thought of murdering him with his own hands.

“I needed a hit man to do what I couldn’t,” Gerardo-Olivas said.

He approached a fellow airman and asked if he knew someone who could do the dirty work.

But his fellow sailor alerted his chain of command and he was soon converted into a Naval Criminal Investigative Service informant, Gerardo-Olivas said.

It was then that Gerardo-Olivas said he concocted the plot to have his spouse murdered to fund the contract for the second hit. He decided to share it with his fellow airman.

Saying that he “knew someone,” the airman arranged for a man he called “Mike” to meet with Gerardo-Olivas on July 6, 2018.

It was his wife’s birthday.

At the end of the Independence Day weekend, Gerardo-Olivas dropped his parents off at Norfolk International Airport and he drove to his rendezvous with a hit man.

The two met in the parking lot of Main Gate Movies 10, a theater close to the Norfolk Main Navy Exchange.

“Mike” was an undercover NCIS agent.

A video of the transaction played out in the courtroom. It showed Gerardo-Olivas with a scruffy beard entering the agent’s car.

The two men bumped fists and Gerardo-Olivas handed him an envelope stuffed with $500 in cash — a 10 percent down payment on his wife’s hit — plus photos of her and a detailed description of where to find her.

“He told me that $5,000 was too low, so I raised it to $10,000,” Gerardo-Olivas said.

The man asked Gerardo-Olivas how he wanted his wife to die, and even offered to rape her.

“Do whatever you want to do. I don’t care,” Gerardo-Olivas replied.

But Gerardo-Olivas told the judge the man’s harsh words and grisly description of her death gave him second thoughts: “I decided that I really did not want to go through with this.”

Gerardo-Olivas said he decided to let the hit man drive away and then ring him later to call off the murder and keep the cash.

But he never got the chance.

NCIS agents swarmed the car and arrested him.

“A sailor was reported missing on board the Lincoln, prompting the command to hold a man overboard (response) which verified the sailor as missing,” said Lt. Samuel Boyle, a Navy spokesman at the Pentagon.

“A search of the ship did not turn up the sailor, prompting the at sea search. “

Lincoln and two of its escorts — the guided-missile cruiser Leyte Gulf and the Spanish guided-missile frigate Méndez Núñez — were continuing the hunt for the sailor, according to a prepared statement provided by the U.S. 5th Fleet to Navy Times.

The Navy has marked the unidentified sailor’s status as “Duty Status Whereabouts Unknown” while the search continues.

Update: This story has been amended to correct a mistake by U.S. 5th Fleet. Pakistan’s guided-missile frigate Aslat offered to help assist in the rescue efforts but it did not, in fact, join the search for the sailor.