surprise-cruiser-shiloh-sailor-presumed-overboard-and-dead-discovered-hiding-on-board

For my first five years in the Navy, I was an Engineman, until I converted to Radioman. Since I served my entire careeer on subs, it would be difficult to determine how this could happen on a surface ship and definitely not on one of my boats. Hell, when we had field days, total cleanup of the ship/sub, every nook and cranny was scrubbed and maintained. There was more to this than meets the eye.
Before it is over, more sailors will be brought up on charges.

Colonel, I suggest tags 'Sailors' and 'Naval/Maritime History'.

Respectfully, spoken like someone who's never seen the engine room of a fairly large ship. They're huge, for one thing, often 4, 5 stories tall (with the commensurate decks, and take up something like one-quarter of the aft part of the ship. All by itself, that's a lot of space. Then, add in all the machinery. Hundreds of pieces of equipment, all over the place, all sorts of cladding, pipes, wire runs, deck grates (easily lifted and crawled into), and nooks and crannies. There's literally thousands of places you could hide. For example, the bilges are rarely entered physically unless there's need. Etc. Now, that said, the typical temp in any given engine room is roughly 110 degrees. 24/7. You can ALWAYS tell who the snipes are at meal time on ships, because they'll be the ones showing up drenched in sweat. Without replenishing water, you'd die of dehydration within what, a day or so? So. This guy had help, because there's no way he was leaving to go get water (or food) without being seen.