This was designed to simulate the first leg of an advance from Hawaii towards Asia, especially how well the ships could handle the long transoceanic voyage. During Fleet Problem II, the Navy refined at sea refueling techniques, including refueling side-by-side for the first time between the oiler Cuyama (AO-3) and three other ships. Fleet Problem III and Grand Joint Army-Navy Exercise No. 2 During Fleet Problem III, the Scouting Force, designated the "Black Force," transited from its homeport in the Chesapeake Bay towards the Panama Canal from the Caribbean side. Once in the Caribbean, the naval forces involved in Fleet Problem III joined with the 15th Naval District and the Army's Panama Division in a larger joint exercise. The Blue force defended the canal from an attack from the Caribbean by the Black force, operating from an advance base in the Azores. This portion of the exercise also aimed to practice amphibious landing techniques and transiting a fleet rapidly through the Panama Canal from the Pacific side. Black Fleet's intelligence officers simulated a number of sabotage operations during the course of Fleet Problem III. On January 14, Lieutenant Hamilton Bryan, Scouting Force's Intelligence Officer, personally landed in Panama with a small boat. Posing as a journalist, he entered the Panama Canal Zone. There, he "detonated" a series of simulated bombs in the Gatun Locks, control station, and fuel depot, along with simulating sabotaging power lines and communications cables throughout the 16th and 17th, before escaping to his fleet on a sailboat. On the 15th, one of Bryan's junior officers, Ensign Thomas Hederman, also snuck ashore to the Miraflores Locks. He learned the Blue Fleet's schedule of passage through the Canal from locals, and prepared to board USS California (BB-44), but turned back when he spotted classmates from the United States Naval Academy - who would have recognized and questioned him - on deck. Instead, he boarded USS New York (BB-34), the next ship in line, disguised as an enlisted sailor. After hiding overnight, he emerged early on the morning of the 17th, bluffed his way into the magazine of the No. 3 turret, and simulated blowing up a suicide bomb - just as the battleship was passing through the Culebra Cut, the narrowest portion of the Panama Canal. This "sank" New York, and blocked the Canal, leading the exercise arbiters to rule a defeat of the Blue Force and end