By the U.S. Southern Command Public Affairs
MIAMI - The amphibious ship, USS Boxer arrived in Guatemala's coastal city of Puerto San Jose Tuesday, marking the start of Continuing Promise 2008 -- a two-phased, humanitarian assistance mission to nine nations in the Caribbean, Central and South America.
Boxer, home ported in San Diego, is the first of two amphibious ships supporting Continuing Promise 2008 and is scheduled to visit three countries through June during the mission's Pacific phase.
The amphibious ship's crew of approximately 1,200 sailors includes medical, dental, veterinary and engineering personnel who will conduct two-week visits to impoverished, coastal communities in Guatemala, El Salvador and Peru, where they will partner with local officials and non-governmental organizations to provide health care services and conduct engineering projects for local citizens.
During the deployment, Boxer will be staffed and configured to provide a wide range of medical services to individuals and communities, including individual health care services, individual preventive care services, community public health assessments and medical training for local health-care professionals.
A team of U.S. Navy Seabees embarked aboard Boxer will lend its engineering expertise to support various construction and renovation projects at each of the countries visited.
As part of its mission to the region, the ship's crew will also deliver approximately $138,000 in donations collected in the U.S. by Project Handclasp -- a nonprofit organization that has partnered with the U.S. Navy and U.S. Southern Command to transport humanitarian donations aboard U.S. Navy vessels visiting countries in the Caribbean, Central and South America.
USS Kearsarge will be the second amphibious ship supporting Continuing Promise 2008 and will conduct two-week visits to six countries in the Caribbean, Central and South America from August through November in support of the humanitarian mission's Atlantic Phase.
One of the objectives of Continuing Promise 2008 is to build on the successes achieved during the deployment of the hospital ship USNS Comfort from June through October 2007. During Comfort's 2007 deployment, its crew treated 98,658 patients during visits to a dozen Caribbean, Central and South American countries that lasted an average of 8 days.
The longer visits to be carried out during Continuing Promise 2008 will allow for greater collaboration and coordination between the ships' crews, host nation officials and participating NGOs, improving the effectiveness of the humanitarian services provided.