The US Navy’s Wasp-class amphibious assault ship USS Wasp (LHD 1) arrived at its new homeport of Naval Station Norfolk on November 18, completing a homeport shift after spending nearly two years forward deployed Japan.
The ship had been assigned to Commander Fleet Activities Sasebo and operated in the US 7th Fleet (C7F) area of operations.
Wasp departed Sasebo in late August and will be replaced by the America-class amphibious assault ship USS America (LHA 6) later this year.
“I’m honored to be on the pier for USS Wasp’s return to Naval Station Norfolk, and to fold this awesome warship and its crew back into ESG-2, our navy’s forward-leaning blue/green warfighting team,” said Rear Adm. John Mustin, commander, Expeditionary Strike Group 2.
“I look forward to meeting with the crew and learning from their time abroad, particularly their lessons learned from deploying with the F-35B Lightning II – a critical high-end capability that I’m eager to incorporate into our east coast amphibious task forces.”
Wasp arrived in C7F in January 2018 to replace the USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD 6), and had been operating with US Marines from the 31st Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU). While working together, the Blue-Green team worked to expand upon the robust relationships that US forces maintain with regional allies and partners.