Following a four-month patrol, the US amphibious dock landing ship USS Germantown (LSD 42) will now start maintenance works in Sasebo, Japan.
The vessel returned to its forward-deployed home port on November 4. It will now begin a maintenance availability period to sustain the ship’s readiness posture as a forward-deployed Naval force asset before beginning operations again in 2016.
Germantown’s accomplishments during the patrol included several key regional engagements, bilateral exercises and the completion of several mission critical warfare certifications. The vessel also completed three phases of bilateral exercises during Cooperation Afloat, Readiness and Training (CARAT) 2015 with partner nations Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.
The LSD also participated in Amphibious Landing Exercise PHIBLEX, working with Philippine Navy counterparts to expose them to expeditionary warfare and integrating U.S. Marines with their Philippine Marine counterparts and strengthening interoperability with the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP).
Germantown wrapped up her patrol with participation in the annual III Marine Expeditionary Force (MEF) exercise Blue Chromite 2016.
Some of the ports visited during the deployment include Surabaya, Indonesia; Pattaya Beach, Thailand and Hong Kong, China.
Each port served as a stage for engagement with host nation partners. Guam and Okinawa, Japan were also visited to facilitate equipment on-loads as well as to offer some liberty to the Sailors.
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Image: US Navy