Being an Army guy my entire career, I’ve never had the pleasure of spending months at a time onboard a ship at sea with the Navy. I’ve heard tales that it can be less than exciting. I suppose that would be especially true if you were an internet junkie who gets a bit twitchy if they spend any amount of time not being able to check into Facebook or Instagram. Such was the case with former US Navy Command Senior Chief Petty Officer Grisel Marrero, and she found herself in a mess of trouble because of it.

Marrero found herself in hot water after she and a group of senior enlisted personnel secretly installed an unauthorized Starlink satellite system aboard the USS Manchester during its 2023 deployment to the West Pacific. The satellite dish was surreptitiously set up, allowing the chiefs to access the internet for personal use, including checking social media, sports scores, and streaming movies.

For security reasons, internet access is restricted when a ship is at sea. Bandwidth must be available for actual military operations and not streaming American Idol.

Marrero and her co-conspirators went to great lengths to cover their tracks. They purchased the Starlink system for $2,800 and renamed the network “STINKY” to disguise it as a printer. Don’t ask me how naming a piece of hardware “Stinky” makes one think it is a printer. I’m not a tech guy and don’t understand that kind of stuff. Oh, they even went all out and opted for the high-performance kit. Reports indicate that Marrero used to be an information systems technician. Feeling especially bold, the dozen or so sailors who were in on this purchased signal boosters while in port so the illicit signal would reach more areas of the ship. 

I do know, however, that only senior petty officers had access to this network, and lower-ranking sailors were excluded from the felonious fun and games. The scheme unraveled when suspicions about the unauthorized network began to circulate aboard the ship, eventually catching the attention of the ship’s command. Marrero denied the network’s existence multiple times, even intercepting complaints left in the captain’s suggestion box. However, the secret was uncovered when a civilian contractor discovered the Starlink dish during a separate installation of an official Navy system.

Starlink
Image from the official Navy investigation. Note the circled device, that’s the Starlink Dish. Image Credit: US Navy

It gets worse. An investigation revealed that Marrero and her group had used the Chief Petty Officer Association’s debit card to pay the $1,000 monthly bill. Unsurprisingly, the scheme was uncovered sometime in the late summer or early fall of 2023. Marrero was relieved of her duties and faced a court martial. Information regarding this case was only recently released by the US Navy. The investigation notes state, in part,

“The danger such systems pose to the crew, the ship, and the Navy cannot be understated.”