New footage obtained by CNN appears to show that a fire on board the USS Gerald R Ford, the world’s largest aircraft carrier, caused far more damage than the Trump administration publicly acknowledged.
The blaze broke out in March during the US-Israeli war on Iran, but Washington played down the incident at the time.
The video shows sleeping quarters badly destroyed, with sailors’ bunks reduced to charred and twisted metal. The ceiling above the beds appears gutted by the flames, while exposed wires hang overhead and ash covers the floor.
“I seriously thought we were going to lose the ship,” one sailor on board the ship told CNN, describing how he felt while fighting the fire. “It’s either fight or die.”
CNN reported that it took the carrier’s crew about 30 hours to extinguish the blaze, clear the damage and stop it from reigniting.
About 600 sailors were left without access to their bunks because of the destruction.
The cause of the fire remains unclear. Iran has said it attacked the aircraft carrier.
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