Sorry, wrong number: Why law officers couldn’t alert Navy base to gate crasher

When a Jeep Grand Cherokee trying to outrun the CHP was heading toward Lemoore Naval Air Station last March, the CHP tried to alert the base but couldn’t raise anyone.

The reason? They had the wrong contact phone number. The phone just rang and rang.

That won’t be happening anymore at Lemoore or any Navy base in the continental United States.

In the wake of the deadly incident – the gate runner crashed into a jet fighter, killing both himself and his female passenger – the Navy has directed all stateside bases to clean up their act and make sure local law enforcement agencies can reach base officials at any hour.

That’s according to a Navy investigation released to The Bee under a federal Freedom of Information Act request.

The documents include a report about the incident with a timeline of what happened, a letter by an admiral at U.S. Fleet Forces Command in Norfolk, Va., and a letter from the commander of Navy Region Southwest headquarters in San Diego reviewing and commenting on recommendations in a report about the incident.

The heavily redacted documents show that the Navy believes the incident was unique, but one with lessons.

“While this was a very unique set of circumstances that aligned to create a narrow window of vulnerability, it is still a valuable wake-up call,” the commander in San Diego wrote.

The Fleet Forces admiral wrote, “The incident exposed vulnerabilities in ECP (Entry Control Point) security, not only at NASL (Naval Air Station Lemoore) but at all CONUS (Continental United States) regions.”

The incident started about 11:38 p.m. March 30 when the CHP stopped to check on the Jeep parked on a road in Kings County not far from the base.

The Jeep sped off, going the wrong way on Highway 198 at 65 to 100 mph.

The Jeep drove onto the base property but went around the main entrance and toward the operations side, but the sentries there didn’t know the vehicle was coming.

CHP dispatch called the base to tell them the Jeep might try to get into the front gate, the timeline said.

“The phone rang for approximately two minutes and twenty seconds,” the timeline states. “The phone number was associated with a NASL building that had been demolished approximately ten years prior.”

Another call was made, but CHP got a busy signal. The CHP made a third attempt but got a busy signal again.

CHP dispatch then called the base operations phone number which put the call on hold. About one minute and 20 seconds later, base operations transferred the call to a duty officer who was told about the pursuit.

The report is heavily redacted and does not say specifically how the Jeep got past the guard post, but indicates it drove in via the outbound lanes because the report said the Jeep drove north on the southbound lane and that there was a “steady flow of traffic” in and out of the gate at the time.

The report included a recommendation that all installations “immediately develop a comprehensive list of all federal, state and local law enforcement agencies ... and validate all primary contact numbers for these organizations.”

The recommendation will be made formal and both the Fleet Forces Command and the Commander of the Navy Installations Command will develop a message about communications between the Navy and non-Navy agencies involved in anti-terrorism, emergency management and fire and emergency coordination, the letter dated Sept. 27 from U.S. Fleet Services Command deputy commander R. P. Breckenridge said.

This story will be updated.

This story was originally published October 25, 2016 at 6:17 PM with the headline "Sorry, wrong number: Why law officers couldn’t alert Navy base to gate crasher."