USNS Joshua Humphreys (T-AO 188)

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USNS JOSHUA HUMPHREYS is the second ship in the HENRY J. KAISER - class of fleet oilers specially built for the Military Sealift Command (MSC). After commissioning, JOSHUA HUMPHREYS served under the command of the MSC until she was deactivated on June 29, 1996. JOSHUA HUMPHREYS was part of the Atlantic Fleet and was the second ship in her class to be deactivated. The oiler was subsequently berthed at the Naval Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility (NISMF), Philadelphia, PA., until she was reactivated on February 23, 2005. The oiler was deactivated again on October 1, 2006, and again laid-up at the Naval Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility (NISMF), Philadelphia, PA. JOSHUA HUMPHREYS was again called to duty on June 10, 2010, and subsequently served with the 5th Fleet in the Middle East until late 2016.

General Characteristics:	Awarded: January 20, 1983
	Keel laid: December 17, 1984
	Launched: February 22, 1986
	Delivered: April 3, 1987
	Deactivated: June 29, 1996
	Reactivated: February 23, 2005
	Deactivated: October 1, 2006
	Reactivated: June 10, 2010
	Builder: Avondale Shipyards, Inc., New Orleans, LA
	Propulsion system: two Colt-Pielstick 10 PC4.2 V 570 diesels
	Propellers: two
	Length: 677 feet (203 meters)
	Beam: 97 feet (29.6 meters)
	Draft: 35 feet (10.6 meters)
	Displacement: approx. 40,700 tons
	Speed: 20 knots
	Capacity: 180,000 barrels of fuel oil or aviation fuel and eight 20-feet containers refrigerated
	Refueling stations: five
	Aircraft: none, but helicopter deck
	Armament: none
	Crew: 82 civilian crew (18 officers); 21 Navy (1 officer)

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Crew List:

This section contains the names of sailors who served aboard USNS JOSHUA HUMPHREYS. It is no official listing but contains the names of sailors who submitted their information.

Click here to view the list.

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USNS JOSHUA HUMPHREYS History:

USNS JOSHUA HUMPHREYS was laid down at Avondale Shipyards in New Orleans on December 17, 1984, launched on February 22, 1986, and placed in service with Military Sealift Command on April 3, 1987, for duty with the Atlantic Fleet. The new oiler introduced the class standard of five fueling stations for connected replenishment and a flight deck to support vertical replenishment, joining the Cold War logistics pattern of keeping carrier and amphibious forces fueled on the U.S. East Coast, in the Western Atlantic, and into the Mediterranean when tasked.

Through the late 1980s and into the Gulf crisis of 1990-1991, the ship operated under MSC Atlantic tasking. During Operation Desert Storm's maritime interdiction effort, the oiler served as a platform for boarding-training evolutions by SEAL TEAM 8 in the Red Sea. Dated imagery from February 1, 1991, shows the team practicing visit-board-search-and-seizure procedures aboard JOSHUA HUMPHREYS, reflecting her integration into the broader enforcement of United Nations sanctions against Iraq while she continued routine fuel delivery to U.S. and coalition units.

After nearly a decade of Atlantic service, JOSHUA HUMPHREYS was deactivated on June 29, 1996, and berthed at the Naval Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility in Philadelphia. She remained laid up there until reactivation on February 23, 2005, returned briefly to service, and then was again placed out of service on October 1, 2006, returning to reserve status at Philadelphia.

A Navy contract in March 2010 initiated a new reactivation, and by September 2011, the oiler was back forward, photographed underway in the Gulf of Aden during Fifth Fleet operations that combined counter-piracy, theater security cooperation, and routine logistics for deployed strike groups. On June 28, 2012, she conducted a replenishment-at-sea with the Royal Navy destroyer HMS DARING in the Gulf of Oman, emblematic of the coalition nature of Gulf logistics after the draw-down in Iraq and amid ongoing maritime security patrols.

Following several years in U.S. Central Command waters, JOSHUA HUMPHREYS shifted back toward Atlantic and European commitments. She departed Norfolk on January 13, 2017, and, later that winter, relieved LEROY GRUMMAN (T-AO 195) as the Sixth Fleet duty oiler in the Mediterranean, before returning to a Norfolk shipyard period that autumn. In 2018, she supported group-sail workups for the carrier ABRAHAM LINCOLN (CVN 72) off the East Coast, part of the high-tempo reconstitution of carrier strike group training after the Navy's Optimized Fleet Response Plan took hold.

By December 11, 2019, she had completed another Atlantic deployment and returned to Naval Station Norfolk, with local reporting noting several million gallons of fuel and significant palletized cargo moved during that period. As the fleet adapted to COVID-19 operating constraints in early 2020, the oiler remained on task: she fueled DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER (CVN 69) at sea on January 17, 2020. On March 24, 2020, she enabled USS GERALD R. FORD (CVN 78)'s first at-sea vertical replenishment while the carrier conducted qualifications, illustrating how CLF ships kept training pipelines open despite restricted port access.

That same year, she supported cruisers and destroyers preparing for deployment - among them the cruiser VELLA GULF (CG 72) - before completing a five-month Fifth Fleet deployment that ended August 11, 2020. Over that deployment JOSHUA HUMPHREYS executed 51 replenishments at sea and delivered more than 19.2 million gallons of fuel and over a thousand pallets of cargo across the Red Sea, Arabian Sea, and Gulf, a typical volume for a CLF oiler sustaining multiple task groups and independent deployers.

In 2021, she served as Military Sealift Command Atlantic's duty oiler, a role that kept her continuously supporting ships in the Western Atlantic and off the U.S. East Coast without an overseas deployment. Dated imagery in mid-July documents back-to-back UNREPs with BAINBRIDGE (DDG 96), MASON (DDG 87), and TRUXTUN (DDG 103), and a same-day evolution in which she pumped roughly 1.5 million gallons of fuel to the fast combat support ship ARCTIC (T-AOE 8).

As the Navy's focus shifted toward European deterrence, HUMPHREYS integrated with major Atlantic formations. In November 2022, she was listed among the logistics ships backing the GEORGE H. W. BUSH (CVN 77) Carrier Strike Group in the Mediterranean during a heightened period of NATO operations after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. In early 2023, she supported GERALD R. FORD's Composite Training Unit Exercise off the East Coast (with dated photos on March 13, 2023) and then, on June 1, 2023, refueled the carrier again in the Norwegian Sea. During BALTOPS 2023 she delivered more than a half-million gallons of jet fuel and over 400,000 gallons of marine diesel within a 24-hour span to the GERALD R. FORD strike group, before completing a four-month Sixth Fleet deployment and returning to Norfolk on August 10, 2023.

Into 2024 and 2025, the ship remained an East Coast workhorse. A dated Navy item shows HUMPHREYS back alongside GERALD R. FORD in 2023 and then, in April 2025, in Norfolk for an onboard "Starshield" connectivity installation - one of several incremental upgrades that improve afloat communications for civilian-crewed logistics ships. On July 1, 2025, she conducted a replenishment with IWO JIMA (LHD 7) during that amphibious ready group's Atlantic work-up, then shifted south. On September 3, 2025, she refueled IWO JIMA in the Caribbean Sea while the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit worked under U.S. Southern Command tasking, and on September 11, 2025, Navy logistics specialists documented mail support to HUMPHREYS at Jacksonville - routine but telling markers of her presence across the Western Atlantic and Caribbean during the IWO JIMA ARG/MEU cycle.

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USNS JOSHUA HUMPHREYS Construction Gallery:

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USNS JOSHUA HUMPHREYS Image Gallery:

The photo below was taken by Thomas Zera and shows the JOSHUA HUMPHREYS laid up at the former Philadelphia Naval Shipyard, Penn., on September 9, 2001.

The photos below were taken by me on November 7, 2008, and show the JOSHUA HUMPHREYS laid up at the Naval Inactive Ship Maintenance Facility (NISMF) Philadelphia, PA.

The photos below were taken by Steven Collingwood and show the JOSHUA HUMPHREYS departing Naval Base Norfolk, Va., on January 13, 2017. In late February, she relieved the USNS LEROY GRUMMAN (T-AO 195) as the US Navy's duty oiler in the Mediterranean.