The hospital ship USNS Mercy (T-AH 19) arrived in the U.S. 3rd Fleet area of operations Sept. 13 as Pacific Partnership 2015 nears its conclusion.
Mercy, which departed Naval Base San Diego on May 17 for the beginning of PP15, served as the primary platform for the mission. The secondary platform for the mission was the Joint High Speed Vessel USNS Millinocket (JHSV 3), which wrapped up its mission participation Aug. 24 when it departed Da Nang, Vietnam.
Now in its tenth iteration, Pacific Partnership began in response to one of the world’s most catastrophic natural disasters, the December 2004 tsunami that devastated parts of Southeast Asia.
This year, Mercy visited Fiji, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, and Vietnam, providing healthcare and surgical procedures, community health engagements, engineering projects and community relations events in coordination with partner and host nations. Millinocket visited Kiribati, the Federated States of Micronesia, Solomon Islands, the Philippines and Vietnam.
Image: US Navy