The US Navy has identified Chief Cryptologic Technician (Interpretive) Shannon M. Kent, 35, as one of the victims of the January 16 attack in Manbij, Syria. ISIS claimed responsibility for the explosion which killed four Americans and 15 others in front of a restaurant. The US defense department fur
Frigates, destroyers and an aircraft carrier from four nations are currently underway in the Persian Gulf as part of the annual, multinational exercise Intrepid Sentinel 2019. The multilateral exercise is designed to increase capability and interoperability between the four nations. According to pho
US Navy’s guided-missile destroyer USS Chung-Hoon (DDG 93) seized almost five tons of hashish from a dhow in the Gulf of Aden on December 27. According to the US Navy, the destroyer made the interception during a flag verification boarding as part of maritime security operations in the region. “We h
Anzac-class frigate HMAS Ballarat seized over 900 kilos of heroin in two separate interceptions in the Middle East, the Royal Australian Navy has announced. In two boarding operations on December 21 and 23, the frigate’s crew seized approximately AU$279 million worth of narcotics as part of the ship
US Navy’s Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers USS Jason Dunham (DDG 109) and USS The Sullivans (DDG 68) returned to their homeports after completing a seven-month deployment to Europe and the Middle East. On December 21, USS Jason Dunham returned to Naval Station Norfolk while USS The Sull
US Military Sealift Command’s fleet replenishment oiler USNS Big Horn (T-AO 198) pulled into Naval Station Norfolk, Dec. 17, completing a 10-month deployment in the US Fifth Fleet and US Sixth Fleet area of responsibility. “Some of the missions USNS Big Horn undertook during this deployment included
After making two narcotics interceptions in late November and early December, Royal Navy destroyer HMS Dragon has now carried out the largest drug haul in the history of the Bahrain-based Combined Maritime Forces (CMF). According to CMF, Dragon seized and destroyed just shy of 10,000 kg of illegal n
The navies of Australia, France and the US concluded a four-day ‘Ship Anti-Submarine Warfare Readiness and Evaluation Measurement’ (SHAREM) 195 exercise in the Arabian Sea on December 18. Participating ships included French navy F70AA-class air defense destroyer FS Cassard (D 614), and Royal Austral
The Royal Saudi Naval Force (RNSF) handed over command of Combined Maritime Forces (CMF) CTF150 to the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN) in a change of command ceremony at the CMF headquarters in Bahrain on December 6. Commodore Darren Garnier RCN took command from Commodore Al-Shahrani RSNF. The ceremony w
US Navy aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis is scheduled to enter Persian Gulf waters by the end of the week, ending an eight-month period of carrier strike group absence from the region. According to Wall Street Journal who first reported the news, this is the longest period of US Navy aircraft ca
Royal Navy Type 45 destroyer HMS Dragon has seized three tons of hashish in a Persian Gulf operation, the Royal Navy informed. The Portsmouth-based destroyer was on patrol in the Middle East when they came across a suspicious dhow – a type of vessel common to the Middle East – in a notorious drug sm
French Navy anti-air warfare destroyer FS Cassard rescued twelve crew members of the Panama-flagged asphalt-bitumen tanker Durban Queen in the Persian Gulf on November 20. FS Cassard was en route to Kuwait and exercise Pearl of the West when it received a distress call from the nearby tanker. Accord
The US Navy’s expeditionary sea-base platform ship USS Lewis B. Puller (ESB 3) has embarked an MH-53E Sea Dragon helicopter assigned to the “Blackhawks” of Helicopter Mine Countermeasures Squadron (HM) 15 for the first time in the US 5th Fleet area of operations. The training, which concluded Novemb
Type 23 frigate HMS Montrose became the first Royal Navy frigate to forward-deploy to the Persian Gulf as she got underway from Plymouth for a three-year deployment to the Middle East. While the Devonport-based warship will not return home for more than three years, her ship’s company will rotate in
