Posted on 09/02/2005 5:46:13 AM PDT by brwnsuga
NORFOLK — With tears in his eyes, his voice choked with emotion, Capt. Sinclair M. Harris watched his sailors load everything from baby formula to Band-Aids aboard their waiting ships Wednesday in a rush to reach the region destroyed by Hurricane Katrina.
“These are Americans. They need our help,” Harris, commodore of Amphibious Squadron Four, said in the pre-dawn darkness as four ships began to weigh anchor for a rare deployment to help the nation’s helpless.
Nearly 4,000 Hampton Roads-based sailors are en route to the Mississippi and Louisiana shores, bringing helicopters, medical supplies, water, food, bulldozers, blankets and other aid to an estimated 1 million displaced victims.
“We told the crews we’ve got a disaster of proportions that we’ve never seen before,” Harris said.
Endless pallets of supplies, which also included tents, reverse osmosis water purifiers, towels, soap, and tooth brushes, were loaded throughout the night aboard the ships. It will take up to four days to sail the 3,100 miles to their destination.
Late Wednesday, the Navy ordered its Baltimore-based hospital ship Comfort and the Norfolk-based aircraft carrier Harry S. Truman and dock landing ship Whidbey Island to the disaster area. The carrier will carry helicopters from Jacksonville, Fla., to rescue residents stranded since Katrina slammed through the region Monday.
The amphibious ships are carrying landing craft and amphibious vehicles to reach shore. They also are prepared to treat the injured aboard ship or on land in tent complexes set up for medical personnel.
“We will do search and rescue, I am sure, and provide water whatever we can,” Harris said.
The Naval Medical Center in Portsmouth will send 84 people to Mayport, Fla., on Friday to join a surgical unit on board the ships. They include doctors, hospital corpsm en, and pharmacy, lab and X-ray technicians.
Senior Chief Petty Officer Kevin Baker, who runs the amphibious assault ship Iwo Jima’s store, laundry and barber shop, complimented the civilian vendors he called for help.
“They were phenomenal,” Baker said of the vendors, who rushed tractor-trailers full of goods to the piers. “They put everything else on hold and said: 'We’ve got to get those guys loaded.’ They were willing to do whatever it took, whatever I asked.”
Baker has taken the deployment personally, hoping to locate family members in the Biloxi, Miss., area .
“We have a great deal of family down there,” he said. “We heard from half of them but have not heard from four families, and a couple of those were in a direct path up north.”
His niece and her five children were rescued by boat on Tuesday from the roof of their home in the Ocean Springs area near Pascagoula, Miss., he said.
Capt. Richard S. Callas, the Iwo Jima’s commanding officer, said Wednesday that the amphibious group’s response to the crisis carries a variety of options.
The LCAC hover crafts “may be the perfect platform to slip up the Mississippi River to get into New Orleans and drop off 60 tons of supplies in one fell swoop,” Callas said.
His ship will have two of the air-cushioned landing craft aboard. The hover craft require just inches of water in which to operate. They are based at Little Creek Naval Amphibious Base in Virginia Beach.
Teams also are prepared to carve out helicopter landing zones ashore, whether on a beach or in a dry parking lot.
How close the ships can get to the shore will depend on whether they are blocked by sunken boats or floating structures, Harris said.
“With all the oil rigs broken lose and debris right now, we don’t want to run the ships aground,” he said. “But we will get there as fast as we can.”
The Iwo Jima, dock landing ship Tortuga, amphibious transport dock Shreveport and the rescue and salvage ship Grapple will join the amphibious assault ship Bataan, already in the Gulf of Mexico for a training exercise.
The Bataan began flying helicopter rescue missions ashore on Wednesday and was about 30 miles from the mouth of the Mississippi River, Harris said.
Six disaster relief teams, part of a mobile diving salvage unit, an assault craft unit and a beach unit also were aboard. Amphibious construction equipment, medical personnel and supplies are on the ship.
The Iwo Jima, the Shreveport and the Bataan are based at Norfolk Naval Station . The Tortuga and the Grapple are based at Little Creek .
Crew members have been told to expect to be deployed for at least three weeks.
Coast Guard teams based in Portsmouth and Elizabeth City, along with local firefighters and utility workers, also are heading to the disaster area.
Staff writer Elizabeth Simpson contributed to this report.
Reach Jack Dorsey at (757) 446-2284 or jack.dorsey@pilotonline.com.
The Navy is th only service that can handle this situation.
I hope this is only media hyperbole!
That says it all. Somebody ought to tell the MSM.
I say they bring in the battleships and start firing on the areas where the looters and rapists are first.
"I hope this is only media hyperbole!"
Probably not, Commodore Harris is an compassionate guy. He is and his wife are very good people. He is an African-American gentleman, raised by a single mother and a great extended family. He is all about excellence so this ought to be a successful mission.
I am so proud of these sailors that are helping out. They are my people.
Do not confuse uncontrolled emotion with compassion. The good Commodore needs to stow his emotion and use his intellect and experience to pursue his mission.
I've met him. He is a professional. He will take care of business. ...you seem a little judgemental because he showed some emotion. But, like I said, this gentleman is all about excellence. I expect it will be a successful mission.
I see these poor people, and I feel pretty emotional. If you have a heart, you respond to the horrible sight of Americans suffering.
Nevertheless, I appreciate you assuring me of his professionalism.
The guy could run for Governor of Louisiana.
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