T-AH 19 Mercy Class - Deployments
The two hospital ships fall under the Military Sealift Command and are part of the naval fleet auxiliary force. The ships are maintained in five-day reduced operating status (ROS-5) at East and West Coast layberths [in Baltimore, MD and San Diego CA] at their respective Sea Port of Embarkation (SPOE), and within 50 miles of their respective supporting Naval Medical Center/Hospital. In 1996 the requirements for USNS Mercy were realigned to NMC San Diego, consistent with the BRAC closure of Naval Hospital Oakland. The location and sourcing for USNS Comfort remained under close study.
In ROS-5, the ships are maintained by a small crew of civilian mariners and active duty Navy medical and support personnel at a level of readiness which will permit activation for primary mission employment in five days. Activation for other than the primary mission or for training are not subject to this five-day requirement because of the potential need to reconfigure manning, medical supplies, and ship systems to meet the unique requirements of such missions. The notional objective for non-primary mission activation is 90 days depending upon the extent of change required and the urgency of the mission. Each ship shall be activated annually for engineering sea trials for periods of approximately seven days as scheduled by the respective Naval Commander, and quarterly for engineering dock trials. Concurrent full or partial activation of the MTF, or fleet exercise participation, will be scheduled during these trials as directed by the operational or type commanders.
While the decision to employ assigned naval forces is generally reserved for the respective Unified Commander acting through and in concert with their Naval Component Commander, any decision to activate a hospital ship for other than the above routine requirements must be coordinated with the Chief of Naval Operations (CNO).
Mercy went to the Philippines in 1987 for a humanitarian mission. Both ships were used during Operation Desert Shield/Storm. Both Comfort and her sister ship, USNS Mercy were activated for the Persian Gulf war in August 1990. While in the Persian Gulf, Comfort treated more than 8,000 outpatients and admitted 716 patients.
Comfort twice operated during 1994 — once for Operation Sea Signal's Cuban/Haitian migrant interdiction operations, and a second time supporting US forces and agencies involved in Haiti and Operation Uphold Democracy. The hospital ship USNS Mercy was activated during Kernel Blitz 97, a major amphibious exercise in Southern California and waters offshore between 20 June 1997 and 03 July 1997. More than 200 Sailors and Marines were cosmetically prepared to play the role of casualties who were treated by active duty and reserve medical personnel during the medical exercise over a four-day period. Casualties were treated through five echelons of medical care from initial treatment in the field to medical facilities aboard amphibious ships to more extensive treatment on the hospital ship and, finally, to fleet hospital facilities ashore. Casualties were evacuated by National Guard and Coast Guard Medevac helicopters. In 1998, Comfort participated in exercise Baltic Challenge '98, a multinational exercise involving 11 European nations and the United States to improve cooperation in peace support operations. USNS Comfort had two back-to-back deployments to the Caribbean in 1994. During her first Caribbean deployment, Comfort provided medical support for the processing effort and hotel services for U.S. government personnel conducting the processing operations. In addition, the ship served as the platform for hundreds of embarked Haitian migrants each day. By mission's end, Comfort provided safe haven for more than 2,300 Haitian migrants. The ship's second deployment was as a combat support medical asset in support of Haitian contingency operations.In 1998, USNS Comfort participated in Exercise Baltic Challenge, a Partnership for Peace exercise in the Baltic Sea near Lithuania. Ten European nations participated with the United States in the exercise, which included 4,600 military personnel, 17 ships and assorted aircraft. Exercise activities included a 230-person casualty drill and training for more than 100 Baltic nation medical personnel in casualty care. This is believed to be the first time a US ship of this size (894 feet long) had entered the Baltic Sea since World War II. It also was Comfort's first mission to Europe for a multinational exercise.
USNS Comfort, berthed in reduced operating status, in Baltimore, Md., participated in Armed Forces Day 1999 in Staten Island, N.Y., in May. Comfort displayed her medical treatment facility to nearly 2,000 visitors. USNS Mercy, normally berthed in ROS-5 in San Diego, Calif., was partially activated to participate in Kernel Blitz 99, an exercise that simulated simultaneous beach landings, patient movement and blood management for a complex theater operation. The five-day exercise was conducted off the California coast near Camp Pendleton. Mercy’s communication suite was upgraded in fiscal year 1999 to match that aboard Comfort. Mercy’s new state-of-the-art communication suite includes a modern message processing system, digital International Maritime Satellite equipment (INMARSAT B), digital high-frequency radio receivers and new satellite communication gear. Mercy also received a state-of-the-art computerized axial tomography, or CAT, scanner identical to that aboard Comfort.
USNS Comfort was activated Sept. 11, 2001, in response to the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and sailed the next afternoon to serve as a 250-bed hospital facility at Pier 92 in midtown Manhattan. Comfort arrived in New York City Sept. 14, but her mission had evolved in transit from serving as a hospital to providing logistics support to disaster relief workers, some of whom had been napping briefly on the street and then returning to the smoking rubble of Ground Zero to search for survivors. During the next two-and-a-half weeks, the ship served 17,000 meals to New York City police and firefighters, National Guardsmen, New York State Militia and volunteer relief workers from around the country and the world, provided berthing for 2,300 guests and cleaned 4,400 pounds of laundry. The ship's clinic saw 561 guests for cuts, respiratory ailments, fractures and other minor injuries, and Comfort's team of Navy psychology personnel provided 500 mental health consultations to relief workers. Comfort also hosted a group of volunteer massage therapists who gave 1,359 medical massages to ship guests.
USNS Comfort was ordered to activate on Dec. 26, 2002, and set sail for the U.S. Central Command area of operations on Jan. 6, 2003. After stopping in Diego Garcia, the ship proceeded to the Persian Gulf to serve as an afloat trauma center in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Comfort remained in the Persian Gulf for 56 days providing expert medical care to wounded U.S. military personnel as well as injured Iraqi civilians and enemy prisoners of war. When Comfort returned to Baltimore in June 2003, it marked the completion of a nearly six-month deployment. During Comfort's OIF mission, the ship conducted more than 800 helicopter deck landings to bring aboard personnel, patients and cargo. Comfort's Medical Treatment Facility also performed 590 surgical procedures, transfused more than 600 units of blood, developed more than 8,000 radiographic images and treated nearly 700 patients, including almost 200 Iraqi civilians and enemy prisoners of war.
COMFORT was well prepared to care for U.S. and Coalition troops. However, the large proportion (80%) of patients who were Iraqi EPWs or civilians was unexpected. Providing pediatric and obstetric care was also unexpected. Fortunately, COMFORT'S physician staff included a pediatrician and obstetricians/gynecologists. A limitation of the medical regulation/evacuation plan was that there were few options for transferring care of Iraqi nationals after they were admitted to COMFORT.
Hospital ship USNS Mercy (T-AH 19), based in San Diego, set sail 05 January 2005 for the Indian Ocean area as part of relief efforts following the devastating earthquake and tsunami that recently struck the region. The Navy has deployed Mercy in an imaginative way, utilizing a creative approach to provide the type and level of care that would be needed to aid the tsunami victims. There wa an opportunity to configure Mercy with a humanitarian assistance crew - which might be staffed significantly by nongovernmental organizations and people with significant medical capability who can provide relief in other forms. More than 500 US Navy and Project HOPE medical staff, uniformed US Public Health Service (USPHS) members, and Navy support personnel were aboard Mercy.
The U.S. Navy's Military Sealift Command hospital ship USNS Comfort (T-AH 20) departed New Orleans 08 October 2005 to return to her homport in Baltimore after providing several weeks of disaster relief to the Gulf Coast in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Rita. Comfort has been acting as an emergency trauma center for the city since Sept. 28. During the ship's 10 days in New Orleans, Comfort's medical staff has worked alongside local civilian physicians to treat trauma patients aboard ship in a partnership between the Navy and the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals.
USS Mercy completed a five-month humanitarian deployment to Southeast Asia in 2006. Health care workers from both the Navy and civilian organizations on the USS Mercy served nearly 61,000 patients in four countries on the cruise. They conducted over 1,000 surgeries, administered more than 10,500 vaccinations, pulled 6,000 teeth and filled 41,000 prescriptions. Surveys conducted in Indonesia and Bangladesh after the Mercy's visits showed dramatic improvements in attitudes toward the United States. In Indonesia, 30 percent of those polled in August 2006 had positive feelings about the United States; double the percentage reported in a May 2003 survey. In Bangladesh, 63 percent of those polled expressed approval of America.
In mid-2007 the hospital ship USNS Comfort's four-month humanitarian assistance deployment to Latin America was met with success and a welcoming attitude as it provides medical and humanitarian assistance to countries in the region. The ship averaged 780 people on board, about 100 of whom are civilians, Kapcio said. The remainder of the staff is from the U.S. Navy, Army, Air Force and Coast Guard, U.S. Public Health Service, and Canadian government forces.
A naval hospital ship carrying several relief organizations and medical supplies will left Pearl Harbor in May 2008 to provide humanitarian aid in Southeast Asia and the Pacific during a four month mission. Also aboard the USNS Mercy was the Aloha Medical Mission, a Hawaii-based nonprofit organization, and other relief organizations that offered medical care to various countries. The Aloha Medical Mission sought permission from Myanmar’s government to send an emergency mission there after a devastating cyclone, but the country was not visited by the Mercy.
