Alabama Shipyard has been awarded Military Sealift Command hospital ship USNS Comfort (T-AH 20).
Alabama Shipyard has been awarded Military Sealift Command’s hospital ship USNS Comfort (T-AH 20). This is significant because the Comfort is the first hospital ship awarded to this yard in the last 30 years! This is a $25,964,083 firm-fixed-price contract for regular overhaul and dry-docking, with a completion date of July 28, 2022.
The USNS Comfort provides fast, versatile and mobile, medical and surgical services to support Marines, Army and Airforce units deployed ashore as well as battle and task forces at sea. Second, she provides the same services for government agencies to assist in disaster and humanitarian relief. True to it’s red cross and in accordance with the Geneva Conventions, Comfort and her crew carry no offensive weapons. Firing upon Comfort would be considered a war crime as the ship only carries weapons for self-defense.
The Comfort and her sister ship USNS Mercy both began as oil tankers, and were launched in 1976 from San Diego. Comfort’s original name was SS Rose City. She was delivered to the U.S. Navy in 1987, and since then has been an integral part of the Persian Gulf War, the Iraq War, Hurricane Katrina Relief, and most recently, Covid relief efforts in New York, NY. We are excited about this historic arrival.