An internal investigation by the military into the accidental firing of a supersonic anti-ship missile from a naval vessel has revealed a chain of mistakes implicating the most senior officers on the ship, including the captain. The military also said the investigation is now in the hands of the judiciary and it will cooperate fully.
A domestically developed Hsiung Feng III missile was fired from a ship while it was undergoing a drill while docked in Kaoshiung on July 1. The missile was fired into the Taiwan Strait and struck a fishing boat, killing the Taiwanese captain and injuring two other crew members.
The internal investigation pointed to human error at all levels of the chain of command aboard the ship. It indicated that the crew were not fully familiarized with how the missile system works and were too busy preparing for an official visit to follow proper procedures at the time the missile was fired.
The report put forward two suggestions to prevent the situation happening again. One is greater cooperation with the National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology, which developed the missile, for additional training, including the possibility of conducting simulated launches without the missile being live at any point. A second suggestion was for a failsafe launch code to which only the captain of the vessel would have access.