{"id":36600,"date":"2015-10-03T19:07:23","date_gmt":"2015-10-03T19:07:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/navytimes\/uncategorized\/2015\/10\/03\/cruiser-cowpens-celebrates-yearlong-turnaround\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T19:25:53","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T19:25:53","slug":"cruiser-cowpens-celebrates-yearlong-turnaround","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/navytimes\/news\/your-navy\/2015\/10\/03\/cruiser-cowpens-celebrates-yearlong-turnaround\/","title":{"rendered":"Cruiser Cowpens celebrates yearlong turnaround"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>For the crew of\u00a0<span class=\"rte rte-comment\">officers and crew of <\/span>the star-crossed cruiser Cowpens, the cake <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">and drinks <\/span>must have tasted delicious <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">especially\u00a0good <\/span>at\u00a0Capt. Scott Sciretta&#8217;s Sept. 25\u00a0change of command ceremony.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The ceremony capped Sciretta&#8217;s\u00a0year-long command of the\u00a0ship that <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">just one year ago <\/span>was in such poor shape a year ago that the Navy <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">was <\/span>considered<span class=\"rte rte-comment\">ing<\/span> taking it out of service. <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">All eyes were on <\/span>After the previous command triad was fired,\u00a0Sciretta was brought in\u00a0to rally the crew and right the troubled cruiser, where three of the ship&#8217;s last five skippers had been fired. <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">see if he could be the man that could rally a run-down crew and bring new life into a cruiser that some in the fleet were ready to give up on.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><span class=\"rte rte-comment\">And <\/span>On a\u00a0bright Friday in San Diego, Sciretta and his crew celebrated their comeback, including acing\u00a0the surface Navy&#8217;s toughest inspection.\u00a0\u00a0<span class=\"rte rte-comment\">the peaceful transfer of command to\u00a0Lt. Cmdr. Horst Sollfrank, who will oversee a stripped-down crew during a complete overhaul of the ship, was itself\u00a0remarkable because three of the ship&#8217;s\u00a0last five skippers had been fired.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;Your reward was capped off when we completed the Board of Inspection and Survey,&#8221; Sciretta told his crew at the ceremony<span class=\"rte rte-comment\">in his remarks<\/span>. &#8220;I sat there and listened to what the inspectors said: Inspection ready crew; culture of ownership; pride and professionalism; procedural compliance; couldn&#8217;t swing a dead cat without hitting a khaki; sailors engaged in making sure the inspectors knew that it was their ship.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Looking back at his crew from <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">behind the lectern on <\/span>the pier, Sciretta pointed at the hull: &#8220;Your blood; your sweat; your tears: I &#8230; I can&#8217;t thank you enough.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Sciretta transferred reins of the 24-year-old ship to\u00a0Lt. Cmdr. Horst Sollfrank, who will oversee a stripped-down crew during a complete overhaul of the ship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The ship is headed into a four-year\u00a0modernization period where the ship will be <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">completely <\/span>overhauled and outfitted with some of the most advanced sensors and systems in the fleet today.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At the ceremony the outgoing CO credit his crew with the resurrection of\u00a0Cowpens, consummated by a successful INSURV inspection in late summer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The INSURV inspectors&#8217; description of the Cowpens crew was a far cry from how the ship was described in the wake of their fraught 2013-2014\u00a0deployment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When safety inspectors walked through the ship in the spring\u00a0of 2014<span class=\"rte rte-comment\"><strong>RIGHT YEAR?<\/strong><\/span>, they found spaces the crew didn&#8217;t even know existed with major safety lapses. They discovered a flight deck that was in such poor condition that it needed to be decertified and found that sailors were being qualified for watch stations by sailors whose own quals were lapsed or non-existent, a problem described as persisting &#8220;throughout the ship,&#8221; according to an email between senior Navy leaders<span class=\"rte rte-comment\"> obtained by Navy Times<\/span>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Compounding the issues was the ship&#8217;s enigmatic skipper<span class=\"rte rte-comment\">CO<\/span>, Capt. Greg Gombert,\u00a0who\u00a0essentially holed up in his in-port cabin\u00a0<span class=\"rte rte-comment\">disappeared from the ship&#8217;s daily life <\/span>in the middle of a Western Pacific deployment, largely ceding\u00a0his authority to a female department head\u00a0<span class=\"rte rte-comment\">junior lieutenant commander <\/span>with whom he is alleged to have carried on an affair.\u00a0<span class=\"rte rte-comment\">&#8220;unduly familiar relationship.&#8221;<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Cowpens was beset with mechanical problems that had caused the ship to break down mid-deployment. The issues were so deep\u00a0Navy leaders were considering decommissioning the ship instead of fixing it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And in a final<span class=\"rte rte-comment\">, cruel<\/span> twist, <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">just one <\/span>weeks into Sciretta&#8217;s command, his new executive officer was fired for alleged drunken driving, a drama that played out on the ship in front of the in-port duty section.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">All these issues and scandals played out in the public eye, as details of the Cowpens&#8217; troubles prompted national headlines and caused some to question whether the ship&#8217;s trials were indicative of larger leadership and maintenance issues in the surface fleet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A month after that, the surface boss <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">went to <\/span>visited <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">the ship to address <\/span>the crew, donning a cowboy hat as an homage to the ship&#8217;s nickname, &#8220;The Mighty Moo.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"7073\" height=\"4445\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/635793147306916087-nav-cruiser-cowpens-2jpg.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-70198\" srcset=\"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/635793147306916087-nav-cruiser-cowpens-2jpg.jpg 7073w, https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/635793147306916087-nav-cruiser-cowpens-2jpg.jpg?resize=300,189 300w, https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/635793147306916087-nav-cruiser-cowpens-2jpg.jpg?resize=768,483 768w, https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/635793147306916087-nav-cruiser-cowpens-2jpg.jpg?resize=1024,644 1024w, https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/635793147306916087-nav-cruiser-cowpens-2jpg.jpg?resize=1536,965 1536w, https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/635793147306916087-nav-cruiser-cowpens-2jpg.jpg?resize=2048,1287 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 7073px) 100vw, 7073px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">140417-N-SU278-030\rSAN DIEGO (April 17, 2014) Tug boats escort the guided-missile cruiser USS Cowpens (CG 63) into Naval Base San Diego following its deployment. Cowpens played a critical role in Operation Damayan, a joint service humanitarian assistance and disaster recovery mission following Super Typhoon Haiyan in the Republic of the Philippines. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Will Gaskill\/Released) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><span>Cruiser Cowpens returned from a 7-month deployment in April 2014, after which its commanding officer, acting executive officer and command master chief were fired when investigators uncovered evidence of a highly unusual cruise, where the CO largely holed up in his cabin and allegedly had an &#8220;unduly familiar&#8221; relationship with the acting XO.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><span>Photo Credit: MC3 Will Gaskill\/Navy<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;Obviously they had been through a rough time,&#8221; Vice Adm. Tom Rowden, the head of Naval Surface Forces,\u00a0said in a Sept. 30 phone interview. &#8220;It&#8217;s a rough time any time you have to relieve a commanding officer, and they had to endure that. But I encouraged them to put that as rapidly and as far in their wake as they possibly could, and press on with the business at hand. \u2026 Standing around looking at our wake doesn&#8217;t accomplish anything and there was important business at hand.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Top SWO Rowden credits Sciretta, along with his executive officer Cmdr. Justin Harts and Command Master Chief Richard Putnam, for the turnaround.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8220;I saw the transformation of that crew,&#8221; Rowden said. &#8220;One of the things I love about the youth that joins <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">the youth of <\/span>the United States Navy is their ability to recognize goodness. And I think that certainly they were challenged under the previous leadership of the Cowpens, but I think that Capt. Sciretta, Cmdr. Harts and Master Chief Putnam came on board, they saw just how good it could be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;I think our young people respond well to good leadership and they respond superbly to superb leadership.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">To Rowden, the transformation of Cowpens was visible inside and out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;As I approached the ship the day of [change-of-command], I was taken aback at just what a fantastic job the crew of that ship had done to prepare that ship for entering into phased modernization,&#8221; he said. &#8220;She looked absolutely phenomenal.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sciretta is in the middle of a split command tour. He will go on to command another <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">troubled <\/span>cruiser that&#8217;s seen recent tumult, the Lake Erie, which is also based in San Diego. The CO of the Lake Erie was fired in April for command climate issues.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Officials said Sciretta was in training and not available for an interview by press time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n<p>Rowden said Sciretta&#8217;s ability to fix command climate issues was only part of the calculus in dispatching him to the <span class=\"rte rte-comment\">putting him on <\/span>Lake Erie.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;Certainly the ability to motivate as Capt. Sciretta is so capable of doing, but more importantly the tactical and professional expertise that he will bring to Lake Erie as she exits her maintenance availability and starts working up for that next deployment,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For the star-crossed cruiser Cowpens, the cake must have tasted delicious at the Sept. 25 change of command ceremony.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":70195,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":65,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[12,65],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3231],"class_list":["post-36600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-your-navy"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"6IQ4VQGC2RBWNACKD4LFDI2BUE","arc_canonical_url":"\/news\/your-navy\/2015\/10\/03\/cruiser-cowpens-celebrates-yearlong-turnaround\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.0 (Yoast SEO v28.1) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Cruiser Cowpens celebrates yearlong turnaround - Navy Times<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"For the star-crossed cruiser Cowpens, the cake must have tasted delicious at the Sept. 25 change of command ceremony.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Cruiser Cowpens celebrates yearlong turnaround\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"For the star-crossed cruiser Cowpens, the cake must have tasted delicious at the Sept. 25 change of command ceremony.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/navytimes\/news\/your-navy\/2015\/10\/03\/cruiser-cowpens-celebrates-yearlong-turnaround\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Navy Times\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-10-03T19:07:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-08-08T19:25:53+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"David B. 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