After a string of sailors assigned to the USS George Washington took their own lives in 2021 and 2022, the Navy opened an investigation to see if there were any commonalities that would suggest action should be taken.
The report from that investigation, which was released Monday, largely absolved the Navy of creating an environment that led to the suicides. But it offered a much more comprehensive and authoritative look at the lives of the victims, painting a picture of sailors facing the consequences of a ship whose leaders were oblivious to the problems before them and a Navy whose efforts to offer mental health care were insufficient and rife with mistrust.
Those conditions left the sailors to struggle all alone.
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The report pointed to a range of issues facing the sailors but didn't find a common thread. In one portion, investigators suggested that leadership failed by not punishing a sailor enough while, in another, an admiral put blame on senior leaders' failure to understand the sailors they lead.
In its description of the lives of three sailors who died by suicide, the report lays out the types of pressures that can happen aboard any ship in the Navy, but were concentrated on a troubled carrier stuck in the yard.
Master-At-Arms Seaman Recruit Xavier Mitchell-Sandor was one of hundreds of junior sailors who had to live aboard…
