The US Navy’s newest and largest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford, was out for just two days after a March 12 laundry fire was extinguished, the top US Navy official said, the first sign that the fire was disrupting combat operations against Iran.
The ship was sailing in the Red Sea as part of Operation Epic Fury when the fire broke out.
The U.S. 5th Fleet said in a statement on March 12 that the ship remained fully operational after the fire, which was not combat-related and left two sailors with non-life-threatening injuries.
Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Darryl Caudle spoke Tuesday with the Washington-based think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and praised how the Ford’s crew responded to the Laundry Space fire.
“They fought and subdued it, and two days later they were flying. I’m so proud of that crew,” he said.
U.S. officials told CNN last month that it took about 30 hours to extinguish the fire, remove water damage and other materials used to extinguish it, and ensure there was no flare-up.
The official also said the fire damaged just over 100 beds, as some sleeping areas are adjacent to the laundry area where the fire started. But they confirmed that a total of about 600 sailors had been evacuated from their sleeping quarters and bunks.
The Ford was withdrawn from combat just over a week after the fire, and the Navy announced that the 100,000-ton warship was being sent to the U.S. military base in Souda Bay, Greece, for repairs.
A Sixth Fleet statement said seven of the Ford’s berths were repaired while in port on Crete.
The Navy has not released any information that may have caused the March 12 fire, but a March 28 statement from the Sixth Fleet said, “Military and federal civilian law enforcement agencies continue to investigate an onboard fire that started in the ship’s laundry facility.”
CNN has asked 6th Fleet for an update on the investigation.
As of earlier this week, Ford was off the coast of Split, Croatia, which Caudle said Tuesday was “a well-deserved vacation.”
He told the CSIS event that the Ford’s deployment, which began when it left its home port in Norfolk, Virginia, in late June last year, has extended to a “record-breaking” 11 months, and that the ship will “return to station here soon.”
The admiral called the length of the Ford’s deployment “extraordinary” and acknowledged the strain on personnel and equipment.
But the Navy was “built for that,” he says.
“The sailors who are doing this, this is what they signed up for,” Caudle said.
He did not say whether the Ford would remain in the Mediterranean or return through the Suez Canal to the Red Sea, where the fire started.
The aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush and its strike group left Norfolk on Tuesday and are headed to the U.S. Central Command’s area of responsibility, which includes the Middle East, CNN reported.
The aircraft carrier move came after President Donald Trump said in a televised address Wednesday that the United States would increase military pressure on Iran in the coming weeks.
“We’re going to hit them very hard over the next two to three weeks. We’re going to take them back to the stone age where they belong,” the president said.
Meanwhile, Caudle on Tuesday expressed concern about how the war with Iran is impacting U.S. naval readiness and deterrence in other regions.
“The challenge is… how to focus more resources on one area while buying off risks in other parts of the world,” the CNO said.
CNN’s Haley Britsky and Zachary Cohen contributed to this report.
