By 4am on Thursday, the sky still pitch black, 19-year-old Pvt Grayden Monroe and his mom had arrived to the naval base in San Diego, California, the very first military family members huddled on a set of metal bleachers overlooking the dark water. They were waiting for Monroe’s 21-year-old sister to step off the USS Abraham Lincoln, the embattled aircraft carrier that has been at sea for the better part of a year. Monroe, a soldier stationed at Fort Campbell, was wearing his army uniform for the occasion.
The atmosphere was a de facto festival, with a live band, performers on stilts, therapy dogs, handmade signs, giant cutouts of sailors’ smiling faces. People cried, laughed, screamed with joy. When the Lincoln appeared in the middle distance around noon, rounding the corner past downtown, cheers erupted from around the bay.
Sailors flanked the edges of the ship in uniform, waving to the crowd and making phone calls to loved ones. Below American-flag bunting, rust stains were visible on the sides of the carrier. The massive, city-like ship had finally reached land.
Military families and friends have longed for this day for months. The Lincoln first left San Diego last November, with an expected return date sometime in the spring. But as the US and Israel launched a war with Iran, the aircraft carrier was diverted to the Middle East, extending the deployment for the roughly 5,000 sailors and marines onboard for a then unknown amount of time.
The Lincoln’s deployment ended up spanning 321 days, including 264 consecutive days at sea without a port call, a record in modern naval history, the Defense Department said. For months, sailors have reported hazardous living conditions onboard the Lincoln: shortages of food and basic supplies, a spate of suicide attempts and a general sense of deteriorating mental health and declining morale. The reports immediately set off a political firestorm, with Democratic lawmakers calling for an investigation, even as Donald Trump and the US defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, sought to downplay the situation.
The US navy confirmed last month that eight service members from the Lincoln and its accompanying strike group had attempted suicide since the start of the deployment. After the Lincoln’s return home was officially announced in August, it took the carrier almost two long months to get back to San Diego, making a brief port call in Thailand and then tracing a route east across the Pacific Ocean. But on the naval base on Thursday, the scene wasn’t completely euphoric.
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