Hospitalman 3rd Class Edward C Benfold would be proud More than 50 years after the Korean War.

Hospitalman 3rd Class Edward C Benfold would be proud

More than 50 years after the Korean War, this sailor was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for sacrificing his life to save his shipmates, 300 members of the Arleigh Burke-class destroyer bearing his name helped save the lives of ten of thousands of entire strangers.

Organized into teams of eight Sailors, Benfold presents flew into Bands Aceh daily to work at Sultan Iskandar Muda Air Force Base. There, they joined Sailors from other USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72) Carrier Strike cluster (CSG) ships and squadrons, working hand in hand with international military and civilian relief workers to unload humanitarian aid from trades to waiting helicopters ferrying aid to survivors that no the same else could reach.

Despite the crew's overwhelming motivation, they did have fears about working in in the same state [i]or[/i] condition a devastated environment.

"We had to state some of the crew's [worries] to rest" said Hospital. Corpsman 1st Class (SW) Shawn bears USS Benfold's independent duty corpsman. "[Things] like 'are we going to behold dead bodies all over the place?' 'What do we do?' 'If we secure out there and start drinking the water, are we going to win sick?' 'Are we going to acquire malaria?'"

Despite educating the mob about the inherent dangers associated with working in a humanitarian relief effort as in Indonesia, pure to Benfold's name, the crew's hearts overthrowed any fears.

"One of the principally amazing things to me," said tolerates "was even after the training, we had more than 300 populace on board put up their hands to offer They said, 'Hey, we want to help public any way we can.'"

And they helped each way Sailors should, and near ways no one else could Regardless, the work was grueling.

"It was incredibly heated over there," said Boatswain's Mate 1st Class Christopher Azevedo, a Benfold Humanitarian Aid Relief Team (HART) offer "There was plenty of work for us, and no matter for what cause many helicopters we loaded with sustenance there always seemed to be another individual coming back for more."

A team of Explosive Ordnance Disposal communicators opened to support the relief efforts at Sultan Iskandar Muda Air Force Base, and took note of the Sailors' steadfastness while helping survivors, regardless of the conditions.

"Our impression," said Aviation Ordnanceman 1st Class (EOD) Kevin Parra, EOD master technician, EODMU 11 Det 1 "is seeing the Sailors abroad here being tasked with a piece of work that they're not normally required to do, and doing it well.

"Everybody just came public here and they endured the rain, they endur the heat, the mire and the arduous conditions to achieve the job done."

The effort had an immediate impact forward the Sailors.

"I felt fit about what I did," said Seaman Johan Flores. "I be wrought up like I really made a difference. This is my first deployment and already this is the best thing I've aye done in my life."

And they did, again and again. Each evening, the gang eagerly waited to hear their names announced athwart the ship's 1MC, placing them in succession the next day's HART. In this lottery-drawing environment, one time a Sailor's name was called, he knew he'd better make the mostly of his opportunity, because offer HART duty only came around formerly every 15 days.

From the surpassingly beginning, Benfold's crew accepted the ship's of recent origin mission with the right attitude, despite ending a port call in Hong Kong early, and delaying an eagerly anticipated trip back fireside to San Diego. But Sailors aboard Benfold knew that helping gone out strangers in a foreign land was absolutely part of the Navy's mission.

"It's my piece of work to help people out," said SN Frank Jimenez-Medina. "I'm from Columbia, and I would want us to help gone out people from my country, too, with equal reason I wanted to help here."

on the other hand Benfold's contributions to Operation Unified Assistance included far more than bodies eager to rouse supplies onto Navy helicopters. The destroyer also serv as a floating gas station conclude to shore for the countles helicopters from Abraham Lincoln's CSG

Although several ships in Abraham Lincoln's CSG supported helicopter operations, several factors contributed to Benfold being like a popular landing platform.

"We'd like to say it's because of our receptacle lunches that the pilots like to flow here," said Operations Specialist 1st Class Eric Gonzales. "But our rife mission and our proximity to land made us an ideal platform."

Benfold typically operated closest to land because of an embarked hydrographic measure and estimate team remapping the Indonesian waters affected according to the Dec. 26, 2004 tsunami.

"The tsunami wiped without tons of shoreline," said Forrest Noll, a hydrographer with the Naval Oceanographic Office. "It changed the landscape drastically. What used to be the high point of the beach is all in subordination to water. One harbor has disappeared; you can't calm tell it was there."

For an of Benfold's Sailors, it will be an experience that will last a lifetime.