Brown said the steering apparently stopped working on the 844-foot-long Essex, which was carrying 982 crew members on its way to San Diego for scheduled maintenance. It had spent the past 12 years based in Sasebo, Japan, as command ship for the Navy’s Expeditionary Strike Group 7.

The Essex was traveling with a new crew that came aboard for the trip to California. The ship recently underwent a crew swap with another amphibious assault ship, the Bonhomme Richard, as part of a standard procedure in the Navy to keep its ships operating.

The Essex and Yukon were both able to continue toward San Diego despite the damage, which the Navy said did not compromise their fuel tanks or systems.

The Yukon arrived at the Navy base in San Diego after 3 p.m. Wednesday with its crew of 82, including 78 civilian mariners and four military crew members.

The Essex was keeping to its planned arrival time of 9 a.m. Thursday.

Brown said the damage was still being assessed. He said he couldn’t say how fast the ships were moving at the time of the crash because the Navy is still investigating the cause.

The standard speed for ships lining up to refuel at sea is about 13 knots, or 15 mph, Brown said. No lines or hoses had been connected because the two vessels were just approaching each other.

The ships likely just bounced off each other, said maritime safety consultant James W. Allen.

Even so, he said, with massive ships, it can be “a pretty hard bump that can bend metal” and cause dents. The Essex, known as the Iron Gator, resembles a small aircraft carrier, while the Yukon is 677 feet long.

Navy ships routinely refuel at sea while under way.

“They were probably so close there was no time to respond when the steering went out,” said Allen, who served 30 years in the Coast Guard.

Navy officials said it was the Essex’s first collision. The ship, however, has had mechanical problems.

The military publication Stars and Stripes reported in February that twice over a seven-month period, missions were scrapped because of mechanical or maintenance issues involving the 21-year-old flagship commissioned in San Diego

Navy spokesman Lt. Richard Drake at the time blamed it on wear and tear. 3rd Fleet officials said they could not comment on that since at the time the Essex was in the 7th Fleet in Japan. 7th Fleet officials could not be immediately reached for comment Wednesday.

The Yukon, which was launched in 1993, has been involved in at least two previous collisions, including on Feb. 27, 2000, when it collided with a 135-foot civilian cargo ship while trying to enter Dubai’s Jebel Ali port in the United Arab Emirates. The Yukon sustained minor damage.

Less than five months later, it was hit by the USS Denver during refueling off the coast of Hawaii. Both ships sustained heavy damage.

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Associated Press writers Andrew Dalton and John Antczak in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

He is the highest-ranking of five Baja California officials arrested in the case, U.S. Assistant Attorney James Melendres said.

A total of 43 defendants were named in the federal racketeering complaint alleging murder, kidnapping and other crimes. Four are still fugitives, and one is awaiting trial. About half of those arrested are U.S. citizens.

Quinonez, 50, was a primary contact in Baja for U.S. law enforcement agencies and was a familiar figure at cross-border gatherings of officials, including parties at the home of the U.S. consul general in Tijuana.

He admitted to helping smugglers working for drug kingpin Fernando Sanchez Arellano in Tijuana, across from San Diego, prosecutors said.

In his plea, he also acknowledged conspiring to launder $13 million for the ring.

It was the 38th conviction for federal prosecutors in the case. Quinonez is scheduled to be sentenced Aug. 6.

Quinonez was arrested in 2010 during a traffic stop in San Diego.

Prosecutors said Quinonez shared information with a cartel associate in March 2010 about a double homicide in Tijuana. Days later, the associate, Jose Alfredo Najera Gil, told another cartel operative that Quinonez was hoping the drug traffickers would buy him an apartment, authorities said.

U.S. Attorney Laura Duffy previously said none of the shared information jeopardized anyone’s safety. She and other U.S. officials have insisted his arrest did not deter cooperation with Mexican officials.

Sanchez Arellano, also known as “El Ingeniero,” or “The Engineer,” is a nephew of the brothers who headed the Arellano Felix cartel, a Tijuana-based group that was once one of Mexico’s top criminal organizations. Most of its leaders have been killed or jailed since 2002.

He spent four days forgotten in the 5-by-10-foot windowless cell before Drug Enforcement Administration agents opened the door.

“I just couldn’t believe that this was legal,” Chong said in an interview Wednesday with the Associated Press. “I’m thinking ‘no way.’”

After his release, he spent five days in the hospital for dehydration, kidney failure, cramps and a perforated esophagus. He had lost 15 pounds.

His attorneys filed a $20 million claim Wednesday against the Drug Enforcement Administration, saying his treatment constitutes torture under U.S. and international law.

The five-page notice, a required precursor to a lawsuit, was sent to the DEA’s chief counsel in Washington. The $20 million figure refers to the maximum Chong and his lawyers would seek.

The top DEA agent in San Diego, William R. Sherman, said in a news release that he was “deeply troubled” by what happened to Chong.

Sherman said he has personally ordered an extensive review of his office’s policies and procedures. The agency declined to say what those were.

Chong said no one has contacted him personally to apologize.

The incident stands out as one of the worst cases of its kind, said Thomas Beauclair, deputy director of the National Corrections Institute, a federal agency that provides training and technical assistance to corrections agencies.

“That is pretty much unheard of,” he said, noting that, in his 40-year career, he has heard of instances where people were forgotten overnight but not for days.

A federal law enforcement official familiar with DEA operations said the agency’s protocols require that cells be checked each night. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the matter, said the cell where Chong was held is not intended for overnight stays because it does not have a toilet.

Federal lawmakers are demanding a thorough investigation. Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., sent a letter Wednesday to Attorney General Eric Holder.

“Please provide me with the results and the actions the department will take to make sure those responsible are held accountable and that no one in DEA custody will ever again be forced to endure such treatment,” the letter stated.

Chong told the AP that he went to his friend’s house April 20 to get high, part of a national, annual countercultural ritual.

Chong slept there that night and, the next morning, agents stormed into the house. The raid netted 18,000 ecstasy pills, other drugs and weapons. Nine people, including Chong, were taken into custody, according to the DEA.

Chong was questioned then agents told him he was not a suspect and would be released shortly. He signed some paperwork, was put in handcuffs and sent back to the holding cell.

As the hours dragged into days, he said he kicked and screamed as loud as he could. At one point, he ripped a piece of his jacket off with his teeth and shoved it under the door, hoping someone would spot it and free him.

Chong said he ingested a white powder that he found in the cell. Agents later identified it as methamphetamine. Chong said he ingested it to survive.

The next day, hallucinations started, he said. They included Japanese animation characters who told him to dig into the walls to search for water, which he tried, tearing apart the wall’s plastic lining.

People can die from dehydration in as little as three to seven days, said Dr. Wally Ghurabi at UCLA Medical Center in Santa Monica.

Ghurabi said Chong was wise to drink his own urine to stay hydrated.

As the days dragged on, Chong said he accepted that he would die. He considered taking his own life rather than withering away by dehydration.

“I thought ‘wow, this was a terrible way to go,’” Chong said. “I just wanted to have a little bit of dignity.”

He sat in the dark, his hallucinations deepening, his breath getting shorter and shorter, even the urine running out, and he screamed for the agents to at least let him have a quick death.

“That’s when the lights turned on and the agents opened the door with very confused looks on their faces,” Chong said. “They said, ‘Who are you? Where’d you come from?’”

Chong was not going to be charged with a crime and should have been released, said a law enforcement official who was briefed on the DEA case and spoke on the condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak about the ongoing investigation.

Chong said he has no criminal record.

U-T San Diego was the first to report the ordeal.

Doctors said Chong’s wounds should heal, but he said he still breaks down in tears.

“I’m very glad they found me,” he said.

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Associated Press writers Alicia A. Caldwell and Kevin Freking in Washington, Elliot Spagat in San Diego, and Amy Taxin in Orange County, Calif., contributed to this report.

Investigators found blank divorce forms in her Ford Explorer, according to a search warrant affidavit. Records indicated that she planned to leave her husband and move to Texas.

Her brother who lives in Missouri City, Texas, told the newspaper Thursday that his sister’s husband had known about the possibility of divorce for a while.

Alawadi’s daughter, who called 911, has told reporters that she found a note near her unconscious mother that read: “Go back to your country, you terrorist.” Detectives found a torn, handwritten note at the scene but analysis indicated it was a copy, according to an 11-page search warrant.

The affidavit did not mention the note’s contents but indicated that investigators wanted to search the house for similar paper stock.

El Cajon police have said the note indicated the possibility of a hate crime, but investigators have stressed they are exploring other possibilities.

Investigators have not identified any suspects. The daughter, Alawadi’s husband, Kassim Alhimidi, and a brother traveled to Iraq last week to attend her funeral.

The daughter, 17-year-old Fatima Alhimidi, told police that she was at the family’s Lakeside home and heard glass break and her mother squeal but thought it was a dropped plate. She said she found her mother unconscious 10 minutes later.

Alawadi had suffered at least six blows to the head, possibly caused by a tire iron. She died three days later.

A neighbor reported seeing a man carrying a brown box running from the area of Alawadi’s house around the time of the attack.

While police were interviewing Alhimidi after the attack, she received a text message reading, “The detective will find out tell them (can’t) talk,” according to the search warrant affidavit.

The affidavit also indicated that the teenager had been upset about her pending arranged marriage to a cousin and that in November she jumped from her mother’s moving car and possibly broke her arm.

Alhimidi said, “‘I love you, Mom,’ opened the vehicle door and jumped out while the vehicle was doing approximately 35 miles per hour,” the documents said. “Police were informed by paramedics and hospital staff that Fatima Alhimidi said she was being forced to marry her cousin and did not want to do so, (so) she jumped out of the vehicle.”

Lt. Mark Coit, a police spokesman, said Thursday the department was not commenting on the ongoing investigation in which the FBI is assisting. But he noted authorities were “not happy” the sealed documents were released.