United States Navy
Anyone who signs up to serve in the United States Navy does so knowing they’ll be sacrificing plenty of luxuries if they end up being deployed out to sea, but some members serving aboard the USS Manchester went to great lengths to ensure they’d have access to WiFi before the scheme blew up in their face.
It should go without saying that the vessels under the purview of the U.S. Navy are governed by a strict and lengthy set of rules dictated by an institution where national security is paramount, and the men and women who serve on those ships and submarines are well aware of the risks that come with breaking them.
However, according to documents obtained by the Navy Times, the fear of discipline wasn’t enough to prevent some crew members on the USS Manchester, a littoral combat ship commissioned in 2018, from going to great lengths to ensure they wouldn’t have to worry about having access to the internet prior to being deployed to patrol the Pacific Ocean in 2023.
There may be no shortage of top-of-the-line communication equipment on a vessel that cost more than $500 million to build, but sailors aboard the Manchester knew they’d be forced to live without the luxury of Wi-FI after they set out to sea.
However, that apparently didn’t sit well with Command Senior Chief Grisel Marrero, who was demoted to the rank of Chief Petty Officer for orchestrating a secret plan to install a Starlink satellite on the weather deck of the Manchester along with at least 15 other chiefs who pitched in to purchase the equipment and cover the $1,000 monthly fee.
Marrero and her co-conspirators were subsequently able to use the Wi-Fi network dubbed “STINKY” to access the internet to stay up to date on news and sports, stream movies and television shows, and text people back home.
As you’d probably suspect, it didn’t take long for other sailors who weren’t invited to join the club to hear about the ruse before it was brought to the attention of the ship’s commander.
The officer primarily responsible for the ploy initially denied any knowledge of the Starlink device before renaming the network to make it look like a wireless printer, and while the satellite wasn’t found after multiple surveillance sweeps, the gambit was officially exposed when a civilian contractor who’d been paid to install a sanctioned Starlink system in August 2023 discovered the illicit equipment.
Marrero was subsequently court-martialed for her role in the plot the Navy says posed a “serious risk to mission, operational security, and information security” and was subjected to the aforementioned reduction in rank as a result.