Ships Deploy to Support Georgia Humanitarian Assistance Mission

NAPLES, Italy, Aug. 21, 2008 - Two Navy ships and a Coast Guard cutter are transporting humanitarian relief supplies to Georgia.

These deployments are part of the larger United States response to the government of Georgia request for humanitarian assistance, U.S. 6th Fleet officials said.

USS McFaul departed from Souda Bay, Crete, yesterday, and the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Dallas will leave later this week. McFaul and Dallas are scheduled to transit into the Black Sea and arrive in Georgia within a week.

The crew of the USS Mount Whitney is loading humanitarian relief materials in the ship's homeport of Gaeta, Italy, and will proceed to Georgia later this month, officials said.

The ships will deliver thousands of blankets, hygiene kits, baby food and infant-care supplies to save lives and alleviate human suffering, officials said.

These surface ships represent the first from the United States to participate in the delivery of humanitarian assistance to Georgia. Both McFaul, based in Norfolk, Va., and Dallas, based in Charleston, S.C., are on regularly scheduled deployments in the 6th Fleet area of responsibility.

(From a U.S. Naval Forces Europe/U.S. 6th Fleet news release.)

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