jQuery Grid Plugin - jqGrid

I have a select input that chooses and populates a jQgrid (#1). When a row is selected on this jQgrid (#1), a second jQgrid (#2) is populated. This is where the problem comes in. Here is the rowselect:

    onSelectRow: function(id){
        if(id == null)
        {
             id=0;
             if($("#ship").jqGrid('getGridParam','records') >0 )
             {
                  $("#ship").jqGrid('setGridParam',{url:"ship.php?uic="+id});
                 $("#ship").jqGrid('setCaption',"That UIC: "+id).trigger('reloadGrid');
             }
        }
        else
        {
            $("#ship").jqGrid('setGridParam',{url:"ship.php?uic="+id});
            $("#ship").jqGrid('setCaption',"This UIC: "+id).trigger('reloadGrid');

The file ship.php takes a 6 digit uic code and processes it via:

$uic = $_GET['uic'];

If I use this select statement in ship.php:

$query_rsShip = "SELECT UIC, Command_Name, Hull_Number FROM command ORDER BY $sidx $sord LIMIT $start , $limit";

it passes all the rows of data to jQgrid (#ship). If I put a where clause on my select statement like so:

$query_rsShip = "SELECT UIC, Command_Name, Hull_Number FROM command WHERE UIC = ".$uic." ORDER BY $sidx $sord LIMIT $start , $limit";

No rows are returned.

if I try this:

$query_rsShip = "SELECT UIC, Command_Name, Hull_Number FROM command WHERE UIC != ".$uic." ORDER BY $sidx $sord LIMIT $start , $limit";

Again, I get all the rows

Then I thought, alright, lets get all the rows and filter them separately like so:

while($row = mysql_fetch_array($rsShip,MYSQL_ASSOC)) {
    $diff = strcasecmp ( $row['UIC'], $uic);
    if ( $diff == 0) {
        $s .= "<row id='". $row['UIC']."'>";            
        $s .= "<cell>". $row['UIC']."</cell>";
        $s .= "<cell>". $row['Command_Name']."</cell>";
        $s .= "<cell>". $row['Hull_Number']."</cell>";

No rows are returned. If I comment out the if clause, it passes all the rows of data.

I'm completely stumped. I'm not sure what else I could try