Entering fifth decade, USNS Mercy still boosting humanitarian and disaster response

FORUM Staff

The hospital ship USNS Mercy — “a floating medical marvel” — marks the 40th anniversary of its launch in 2025. The four-decade anniversary of its United States Navy commission comes in 2026.

The ship, which is critical to U.S. Indo-Pacific Command humanitarian aid and disaster response (HADR) missions, didn’t start out as a medical facility. The National Steel and Shipbuilding Co. in San Diego, California, built the ship as the oil tanker SS Worth in 1976. The company later converted the vessel to a hospital ship that launched in July 1985. The vessel was commissioned USNS Mercy in November 1986.

The ship began its initial training and humanitarian mission in February 1987 with a tour of the Philippines and other Indo-Pacific locations. Medical providers from the Armed Forces of the Philippines, U.S. Airmen, Sailors and Soldiers, and U.S. Public Health Service personnel treated thousands of people, including 1,000 inpatients, during Mercy’s five-month assignment to seven ports. It marked the first of what would become regular humanitarian missions with Allies and Partners in the Indo-Pacific.

Its first disaster response came after a December 2004 earthquake and tsunami hit the Indian Ocean off the coast of Sumatra, Indonesia. The disaster killed about 230,000 people and leveled communities. Mercy deployed as part of Operation Unified Assistance, which treated more than 107,000 patients.

The operation inspired the U.S. Navy-led Pacific Partnership, which began in 2006. It is the largest annual, multinational HADR mission in the Indo-Pacific, working with host and partner nations to enhance interoperability and disaster response capabilities, and increase regional security and stability. Mercy is the centerpiece of the partnership missions.

The 1,000-bed ship has 12 operating rooms, 80 intensive care beds, radiology suite, dental clinic, medical laboratory, pharmacy, optometry facilities, advanced imaging equipment and a blood bank with up to 5,000 units of plasma. It can carry up to 1,300 personnel.

Mercy is “a floating medical marvel [that] transformed into a haven of hope for countless Palauans,” the Island Times newspaper reported after a Pacific Partnership stop in Palau concluded in early 2024.

Mercy also can produce 200,000 gallons of potable water daily, has an oxygen-production plant, and can carry 42,000 barrels of ship fuel and 90,000 gallons of aviation fuel.

“These ships are often seen only in terms of beds and casualties, but they also should be considered part of the larger global prepositioning effort to get supplies and consumables in position to support a wide range of operations,” U.S. Navy Lt. Cmdr. Mike Ackman wrote for the U.S. Naval Institute journal Proceedings in August 2024.

There have been many milestones for Mercy and Pacific Partnership over the decades. Japan, for instance, joined Pacific Partnership exercises off the Philippines in August 2015. A Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) replenishment ship was in Subic Bay to refuel Mercy, which was en route to Vietnam for a seven-nation mission. It was the first time a JMSDF ship had participated in the U.S.-led HADR drills from the former U.S. naval base.

A year later, Pacific Partnership made its first trip to Malaysia, where local civilian and military leaders worked with personnel from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Korea and the U.S. to improve regional disaster preparedness and resiliency.

During Pacific Partnership 2024-1, a four-month, five-stop mission that concluded in early 2024 after a visit to Chuuk, Micronesia, the U.S. and its Allies and Partners distributed 7,667 pairs of prescription glasses and at least 7,440 pairs of sunglasses, completed about 6,850 dental procedures, and conducted 300 surgeries.

“So let this special friendship be … an enduring one that will span decades, islands and nations,” Chuuk Gov. Alexander Narruhn said during the Pacific Partnership closing ceremony. “Let it be practiced on good faith so we can strengthen regional security, unity, stability, collaboration and goodwill.”