The notoriously grueling Navy SEAL selection course has become so difficult in recent years that attempting it has become dangerous, even deadly. With little supervision, the instructors brought their classes to burnout. Students began dropping out of school in large numbers or turning to illegal drugs to try to keep up.

Unprepared medical personnel often failed to intervene when necessary. And when graduation rates plummeted, the commander in charge at the time blamed the students and said the current generation was too soft.

These are the results of a long and very critical navy report released Thursday detailing how “a near-perfect storm” of trouble at the basic underwater demolition/SEAL course, known as BUD/S, injured large numbers of students, sent some to the hospital and left one dead.

“The investigation revealed a degree of complacency and insufficient attention to a wide range of important contributions intended to keep students safe,” the report concludes.

The Navy ordered a review of the course in September, days after The New York Times reported that instructors held students in freezing water for long periods, denied them sleep, beat and kicked them, and refused to allow many Injured students received medical attention unless they first left the course, which is held on the beach at Naval Base Coronado, near San Diego. The students said the doctors regularly failed to intervene and sometimes participated in the abuse.

The issues came to a head with the February 2022 death of Seaman Kyle Mullen, a SEAL candidate who had been suffering from pneumonia and other ailments for days during the most grueling section of the course, known as Hell Week, but did not receive a significant intervention by course instructors or medical staff.

When Seaman Mullen worsened and was struggling to breathe, the medical officer on duty twice advised other students not to call 911, warning them that calling for emergency help could interfere with training, according to the report.

According to the report’s findings, the Navy has made a number of course changes and reassigned eight sailors and officers for failing to perform their duties, including Navy Special Warfare Training Center Commodore Capt. Brian Drechsler, and training command medical director Dr. Erik Ramey. A Navy spokesman said several Navy personnel had been referred to Navy legal authorities for possible punishment.

Reached by phone, Regina Mullen, Seaman Mullen’s mother, said she was pleased the Navy was admitting shortcomings in the medical system, “however, I’m upset there’s still no accountability to date.”

In a statement, the commander of all Naval Special Warfare, including SEALs, Rear Admiral Keith Davids, said the SEALs would work to enact the report’s recommendations to make training safe, adding: “We will honor the memory of Seaman Mullen in ensuring that our fallen teammate’s legacy guides us toward the best possible training program for our future Navy SEALs.”

Navy SEALs have tried for decades to strike a balance, making the selection course challenging enough to select only elite SEALs, but not so difficult that it leaves good candidates broke. Armies around the world consider SEAL training to be a gold standard for special forces, so the course design has an influence far beyond the small Navy SEAL community.

Historically, an average of three out of 10 Sailors who try the course graduate to complete it. But the graduation rate has varied greatly over the years, partly due to the whims of instructors, and the course sometimes resembles institutionalized hazing. In all, around 11 students have been killed and many others seriously injured.

After a new leadership team took over the course in 2021, graduation rates dropped dramatically. When the Navy Special Warfare commander at the time, Rear Admiral Hugh W. Howard, was warned about the drop, he told subordinates that it was okay if no one graduated and that it was more important that the course remain difficult. . According to the report, the admiral added: “Zero is a good number; hold up the banner.”

The instructors, who often had little experience or training for the position, began to view their jobs not as teachers building new SEALs, but as enforcers who “hunt down the back of the pack” to “eliminate” the weak, according to The report. A gradual escalation of tough tactics that the report called “increasing intensity” allowed instructors to push the demands of the course “to the far end of the acceptable spectrum,” leaving students exhausted, sick and injured.

The course had long used civilian SEAL team veterans as mentors, as a way to temper young instructors. But under the new leadership, these seasoned veterans were sidelined. Soon, less than 10 percent of the students in some classes were completing the course.

The course’s medical staff were not prepared to respond to the wave of injuries created by the harsh new dynamics, according to the report, and “repeated exposure to these conditions rendered both instructors and medical staff unreactive to their severity.”

On top of that, according to the report, the medical staff was “poorly organized, poorly integrated, and poorly led, putting candidates at significant risk.”

In the case of Seaman Mullen, the doctors who saw him gasping for breath during training did not communicate what they saw to others who later evaluated him. The medical officers in charge left the sick sailor with very young SEAL candidates who had no medical training.

The commanding officer in charge of the course at the time, Captain Bradley Geary, was warned by civilian personnel and SEAL veterans about the potentially dangerous increase in the number of students dropping out of the course. The report said that Captain Geary “believed that the main reason for the dropout problem was that the current generation was less mentally tough” and that he took no steps to address many of the problems.

“Allowing the continued execution of the curriculum in this manner while accompanying historical, rapid, and significant changes in attrition demonstrated insufficient oversight” by Captain Geary, according to the report.

When Seaman Mullen died, Navy personnel found performance-enhancing drugs, including testosterone and human growth hormone, in his car. An investigation then revealed broader drug use among SEAL candidates, and several students were expelled from the course.

The report reveals that performance-enhancing drugs have been a recurring problem for more than 10 years in the field, but the Navy has never established a testing system to detect the drugs, and even now lacks effective tests.

“Without a rigorous testing program that produces timely results,” the report warns, the Navy “will not be able to effectively deter use.”

In the year since Seaman Mullen’s death, new leaders have made a number of changes to the course, including increased supervision of instructors, better communication between medical staff, and closer medical supervision of students finishing Hell Week. Graduation rates are back up to about 30 percent that SEALs see as normal.

The report makes no mention of the dozens of qualified candidates who may have been wrongfully kicked off the course by abusive instructors and poor medical supervision. Many of these candidates serve the rest of their enlistments in low-level Navy jobs, scraping rust and sweeping decks.

When asked about the issue, a Navy spokesman said there were no current plans to compensate sailors who were forced off the course.