Navy SEALs Drowning Resulted From Negligence, Lack of Training, and Falsified Records
"Massive" failure, sources say. Navy investigation also finds steroids and alcohol among drowned SEALs' effects on ship
ON the evening of January 11th, a platoon of Navy SEALs assigned to the USS Lewis B. Puller conducted a nighttime search and seizure raid of an unflagged vessel in the Red Sea between Somalia and Yemen. U.S. military officers with the Pentagon’s Central Command suspected the wooden dhow was smuggling Iranian weapons to the Houthi-controlled part of Yemen. The Yemeni rebels—who control much of the populated parts of the country on the Arabian peninsula—have attacked commercial and military ships traversing the Red Sea, a major shipping route, in response to Israel’s military offensive in Gaza. CENTCOM ordered a nighttime raid of the dhow to interdict the suspected weapons cache.
The SEALs arrived alongside the wooden dhow in a specialized 41-foot-long speedboat known as a combat craft assault, or CCA, in rough seas. As their boat idled its engine, the SEALs attached ladders to the dhow and began climbing up the side of the smuggling ship one by one as the rough sea yawed, creating significant space between the two vessels. Special Operator 1st Class Christopher Chambers, making his way up the ladder, fell as the waves pushed the ladder away from the dhow. Special Operator 2nd Class Nathan Ingram, a young SEAL new to the unit, jumped in after Chambers. The rest of their SEAL Team 3 teammates continued the mission.
The SEAL acronym stands for Sea, Air, and Land, which refers to the ways the commandos can navigate into a mission. The SEALs conduct years of rigorous training before being allowed to wear the Trident, the unit’s revered unit pin, on their Navy uniforms. And because they are part of the Navy, their mastery of operating in maritime environments makes them unique in the special operations community.
So, what happened once Chambers and Ingram hit the Red Sea’s high waves was as unfortunate as it was unnecessary.
The two SEALs initially popped up from their submersion, but after a few seconds of treading, they were sucked below the water’s surface, pulled down by the weight of the body armor, gear, and weapons they had on.
Chambers was 37 years old when he died. Ingram was 27.
(A third SEAL also fell from the ladder while trying to board the dhow, but he hit the speedboat, and teammates quickly recovered him before he drowned. He survived, though he suffered severe head and neck injuries, and his outlook remains uncertain.)
In the two months since their deaths, the Navy’s 5th Fleet and Naval Special Warfare Command have both opened investigations into what led to the drowning. Because the SEALs were lost at sea, one critical element of both investigations is a video from the mission. It captured the moment Chambers and Ingram entered the sea until they ultimately disappeared below the surface.
Over the past two weeks, I have interviewed four current and former SEALs, Navy officers, and special operations experts about the ongoing investigations. Two active duty officers I spoke with are also familiar with the contents of the SEAL video. All of those interviewed agreed that their deaths were not only preventable but represented what two SEALs called a “massive” failure of leadership and called for accountability, including possible criminal charges.
As a result of negligent preparation, skipped training, and falsified paperwork, the SEALs conducted an operation for which they were untrained and made crucial but fundamental errors during the mission.
A spokesman for the Naval Special Warfare Command refused to comment about the investigation or details about factors that contributed to Chambers and Ingram’s drowning deaths.
“An investigation is on-going to gather more information on what specifically happened,” said a spokesman for the SEAL command. “As a matter of policy, the Navy does not comment on ongoing investigations.”
THE first and most significant failure was that neither Chambers nor Ingram conducted buoyancy tests before deploying the U.S.S. Lewis Puller in December last year. The SEALs call it a “dip test,” getting into a pool or open water with full military gear, including body armor and weapons, to test one’s buoyancy. The precaution is considered a standard (and essential) practice for any maritime mission.
The error of a neglected pre-mission buoyancy test was compounded when the two SEALs incorrectly attached their flotation devices—another indicator of a lack of preparation and poor training before the operation. They were either unfamiliar with where their devices were, the sources said, or because they had not rehearsed entering the water in full gear, their flotation devices—known as water wings—failed to activate. “This is basic, basic training,” said a former SEAL commander.
When the SEALs hit the water, they were too heavy—with negative buoyancy—and could not jettison their gear quickly enough. For the SEALs who have witnessed the video, I’m told, the speed with which they went under was excruciating to watch.
One active-duty SEAL told me that it was “unlikely” the two SEALs wore individual flotation pieces—also basic protocol when operating in open water—that help balance the weight of their equipment and weapons in the water. This senior officer told me the failure to do a dip test was not just confounding but an indicator of poor professionalism inside SEAL Team 3.
“It was as if they were doing a sea mission for the first time,” he said. “It’s a sign that these guys thought they were too cool for school. They thought, ‘We’re big hairy Frogman; we don’t need to check our gear or do a dip test before we go on a mission.’ This is like jumping from a plane without your reserve parachute—you just don’t do it.”
But a secondary failure in Chambers and Ingram’s drowning deaths is arguably worse. According to three sources, SEAL Team 3 officers certified that their men had completed mandatory training of ship-to-ship boarding in open seas. The training consists of armed SEALs boarding a vessel by ladder from their specialized boats and conducting a search and seizure raid. The training is called a “boat assault force,” or BAF. The SEAL Team 3 platoon assigned to the USS Lewis Puller did not conduct boat assault force training before their December 2023 deployment. The Red Sea mission was precisely what the platoon failed to train.
Despite their lack of training, SEAL Team 3 and SEAL training officers at their Coronado, California base certified that the SEALs were “combat ready,” meaning they had performed all their required mission training. When SEAL Team 3 deployed to the Middle East for duty on the Puller, they were technically unqualified to deploy.
“They gundecked the training,” said a source familiar with the internal SEAL investigation. In the Navy, gun decking is a term for falsifying paperwork, often training and maintenance records. Under military law, gun decking is a crime.
A former SEAL Team 6 commander with over two decades in the Teams told me their failure was unforgivable.
“The SEAL officers and [Naval Special Warfare] failed their basic, most fundamental responsibilities. Their job is to prepare their force for war—for going forward. Not only did they not complete their required training—they lied about it. They have a responsibility to the U.S., to the Navy, to their men, and to the mission. They failed at every level. This was like going to war and forgetting your gun. That’s how bad it is.”
Both the current and former SEALs agreed that because both SEALs likely had the same equipment failures—attaching their flotation devices to the wrong place, for example—indicated more significant training problems at SEAL Team 3.
“If it was just one of them who sank this way—you’d blame it on bad luck and the individual. As soon as you learn they both made the same errors and didn’t do a dip test—you realize this was a much bigger fuck up.”
Investigative reporter Seymour Hersh reported last month that one of the SEAL officers on the Puller asked to abort the mission after receiving the order to conduct the operation. One of the sources I spoke to speculated that the SEAL’s resistance to the order was likely because he knew he and his platoon had not conducted the ship-to-ship boarding training before their deployment. The lack of training would make a nighttime operation especially daunting in rough seas.
AFTER their drownings, the SEALs collected Chambers and Ingram’s effects on the Lewis Puller as part of a safety report. Investigators found alcohol and steroids among their possessions but omitted the discovery in their initial report to the SEAL command. After someone filed an inspector general’s complaint, the SEAL Team 3 commanding officer disclosed the illegal contraband to the larger SEAL command.
“The admiral went through the roof,” said the active-duty SEAL. “After everything we’ve gone through with [steroids] in the last two years, he couldn’t believe the [commander] tried to keep it quiet.”
The sources I spoke to pointed out that there was no indication that either performance-enhancing drugs or alcohol contributed to the deaths, but said it illustrated both poor leadership at SEAL Team 3 and insufficient discipline.
The SEAL deaths in the Red Sea also raise concerns about how prepared the SEAL force is after two decades of land warfare during America’s Forever Wars.
“We fucked it up,” said the SEAL officer. “The Navy believes we are at war in the Red Sea, and we couldn’t successfully do it a non-combatant boarding. It’s not like bad guys were shooting at us during the mission. How can the Navy trust us after this? I wouldn’t.”
Meanwhile, the rest of the SEAL Team 3 platoon did complete their mission. The Somali smugglers had Iranian-made missile components among a much larger cargo of consumer goods, as is typical. The Navy sank the dhow and detained its fourteen crew members. The Justice Department charged the vessel’s captain with smuggling weapons. He is currently in federal custody.
But for older SEALs—especially those who served at SEAL Team 6—neglecting to conduct a buoyancy test might be an unforgivable error. That is because the pre-mission check became standard practice after four SEALs drowned during the U.S. invasion of Grenada in 1983, as I reported in my book Code Over Country. Although the mission involved parachuting into the Caribbean Sea and finding their way to boats, there were similar circumstances: a nighttime entry, rough seas, and, after changing gear just before their jump, inadequate preparation to test their buoyancy. Like Chambers and Ingram, four members of SEAL Team 6 disappeared underwater, and their bodies were never recovered.
One of the original members of SEAL Team 6 who participated in the Grenada operations told me for the book that SEAL tactics evolved from failures rather than successes.
“From 1980 to 1984,” the retired SEAL Team 6 operator said, “a lot of our rules were written in blood.”
Matthew, why such a long gap between Substack columns?
Great reporting. Well done.