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USNS Guadalupe (T-AO 200)

USNS GUADALUPE is the 14^th of the 18 HENRY J. KAISER - class underway replenishment oilers and the second ship in the Navy named after the Guadalupe river in Texas.

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Crew List:

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

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USNS GUADALUPE History:

USNS GUADALUPE, the fourteenth HENRY J. KAISER-class oiler, began life at Avondale Shipyard in Louisiana with keel-laying on July 9, 1990, a launch on October 5, 1991, and entry into Military Sealift Command service on September 25, 1992. From the outset she served the U.S. Pacific Fleet with a civilian mariner crew and a small embarked military detachment, moving quickly into the Southern California operating areas to master alongside connected replenishments and helicopter vertical replenishments that would define her career.

In 1993, GUADALUPE settled into a cadence that coupled local training with blue-water support. She conducted early replenishments with surface combatants out of San Diego, including evolutions with USS LAKE CHAMPLAIN (CG 57) and USS ESSEX (LHD 2) during the ship-qualification and work-up cycles of those units, reflecting the broader post-Cold War shift to surge-ready, expeditionary operations across the Pacific. Through these months she also supported carrier air wing training in the Southern California ranges and transited intermittently to Hawaii as the fleet's schedule demanded.

By 1994, GUADALUPE was fully in stride. A dated image places her pierside and operating from San Diego on September 16, 1994, and command histories from the era record repeated at-sea refuelings as destroyers and cruisers validated combat systems and shock trials around Southern California. The oiler's routine then, as for much of her career, was to cycle between Pier-side loadouts, short underway periods to top off escorts and amphibs, and occasional multi-week legs supporting strike-group workups.

In 1995, GUADALUPE's tempo reflected an increasingly WestPac-centric fleet. She conducted replenishments for USS BUNKER HILL (CG 52) while that cruiser operated with the Yokosuka-based INDEPENDENCE (CV 62) Battle Group. The year's pattern - AAW (air defense) training near Japan, punctuated by focused anti-submarine and maritime interdiction drills - meant the oiler's trackline ran from home waters to the Western Pacific, staging logistics to keep the group on station while carrier aviation maintained presence across the region.

During 1996, GUADALUPE again fueled BUNKER HILL and other units under the INDEPENDENCE construct, with the battle group's winter training cycle out of Japan framed by port stops at Pusan and Manila and extended underway periods in the Philippine Sea and approaches. The oiler's role was straightforward but indispensable: rendezvous on signal, stabilize the lifelines and spanwires, pass tens to hundreds of thousands of gallons of DFM and JP-5 per customer, and do it again for the next receiver - often twice daily for days on end.

In April 1997, GUADALUPE was specifically attached to Task Group 70.1 alongside USS INDEPENDENCE, USS BUNKER HILL, USS MOBILE BAY (CG 53), and several forward-deployed destroyers and frigates. That month's tasking covered routine Western Pacific deterrence, with the group dispersing across the Philippine Sea and East China Sea. For GUADALUPE the period meant tight station-keeping refuels in sea states that ranged from placid to punishing, moving fuel to keep the forward carrier group at flight-operations tempo.

The oiler's 1998 calendar shows her repeatedly in company with deploying carriers and amphibs shifting between the Western Pacific and the Middle East. That spring and summer she conducted replenishments with USS JOHN C. STENNIS (CVN 74) during turnover with USS GEORGE WASHINGTON (CVN 73), including large F-44 (JP-5) receipts that underpinned sustained flight operations. Later in the year, she supported USS TARAWA (LHA 1) and associated amphibs on a deployment that touched the Red Sea and northern approaches to the Indian Ocean, with at-sea fuel transfers bracketed by anchorage and exercise periods in Massawa, Eritrea, and Aqaba, Jordan - operations framed by the long-running enforcement of U.N. resolutions on Iraq and heightened maritime security across the Middle East.

In 1999, GUADALUPE continued high-end strike-group support. She refueled USS JOHN C. STENNIS during workups and deployment events, including a single evolution that moved nearly one million gallons of JP-5 to the carrier. She also conducted multiple UNREPs with USS LAKE CHAMPLAIN off Southern California as the cruiser cycled through pre-deployment training. By early 2000, that pattern persisted, with additional replenishments to surface combatants such as USS CROMMELIN (FFG 37) and further evolutions with LAKE CHAMPLAIN in and around San Diego.

After 9/11, GUADALUPE's tracklines more often bent toward the Central Command theater. She remained a regular in Western Pacific and Arabian Sea logistics, servicing carriers and escorts en route to and from the North Arabian Gulf. On June 23, 2004, during a Pacific transit roughly 900 miles northeast of Guam, GUADALUPE responded to a distress call from the Taiwan-flagged fishing vessel HSIN CHIN CHANZ, rescuing 13 mariners and a dog from a fire-damaged hull and standing by until regional authorities could take custody - an unusual humanitarian interlude in an otherwise methodical logistics portfolio. In mid-2005, she anchored off El Salvador during a multinational maritime exercise, a reminder that Pacific logistics sometimes extended to Central America as amphibious groups and partner navies drilled together.

The oiler figured prominently in Pacific Rim iterations thereafter. In July 2008, she moved alongside USS RONALD REAGAN (CVN 76) during RIMPAC, and in the 2010 running she supported an unusually diverse slate - refueling USS FREEDOM (LCS 1) during that ship's first daytime connected replenishment, conducting dual-ship refuels with USS BONHOMME RICHARD (LHD 6) and HMAS KANIMBLA (L 51), operating near USS BENFOLD (DDG 65) and Canadian Navy aircraft, and even serving as the "high-value unit" during an anti-piracy small-boat drill. That same second half of 2010 saw her pass fuel to USS CARL VINSON (CVN 70) as the carrier prepared for sustained blue-water operations.

From 2011 through 2012, GUADALUPE remained in the Pacific logistics rotation, staging out of San Diego and Pearl Harbor to top off destroyers, cruisers, and amphibs. In late 2012 and into early 2013, she continued this pattern, and on July 15, 2013, a U.S. Army UH-60 BLACK HAWK executed a deck landing on her aft flight deck during a San Diego-area training evolution - one of many joint touchpoints that help certify aircrews and flight decks alike.

The 2014-2016 stretch is particularly well documented. On December 6, 2014, GUADALUPE completed a replenishment with USS CARL VINSON in the Pacific as that carrier strike group surged to meet tasking. In mid-2015, she was photographed alongside USS GEORGE WASHINGTON during that carrier's "Southern Seas" deployment, a South American circumnavigation and engagement cruise that required repeated high-capacity refuels while the strike group worked with partner navies. On April 4, 2016, she refueled USS PORT ROYAL (CG 73) during an Independent Deployer Certification Exercise in the eastern Pacific. Later that spring she conducted replenishments with USS LASSEN (DDG 82) on February 22, 2016, and USS SAN DIEGO (LPD 22) on May 25, 2016 - concrete markers of a year packed with both certification support and forward tasking.

GUADALUPE's rhythm from 2017 through 2018 mixed 7th Fleet support with West Coast tasking. In January 2017, she ran a replenishment for the forward-deployed submarine tender USS FRANK CABLE (AS 40). Through 2018, she repeatedly serviced JOHN C. STENNIS Carrier Strike Group units in the Pacific during that group's pre-deployment training and transits, underscoring her role as one of the West Coast's primary fuel movers.

In 2019, she touched three theaters and a major bilateral exercise. On January 3, 2019, GUADALUPE refueled USS MITSCHER (DDG 57) in the Arabian Gulf during the destroyer's 5th Fleet patrol. On April 7, 2019, her master joined U.S. and Royal Thai Navy leaders in Phuket at the start of GUARDIAN SEA 2019, an ASW exercise in the Andaman Sea that saw GUADALUPE operate in formation with HTMS BHUMIBOL ADULYADEJ (FFG 471), HTMS TAKSIN (FFG 422), HTMS LONG LOM (FS 533), and USS LOUISVILLE (SSN 724). On April 12, 2019, she was photographed refueling USS STOCKDALE (DDG 106) in the Indian Ocean, and on April 16, 2019, she conducted a scheduled firefighting foam-system test on her flight deck while underway. The combination - Gulf logistics, Indian Ocean refueling, and Southeast Asian ASW support - captures a year in which one Pacific oiler connected three operational seams.

A major maintenance period followed. In late April 2020, the Navy awarded Vigor Marine in Portland, Oregon, an 87-day dry-docking availability to overhaul GUADALUPE, including tank preservation and flight-deck work - yard time that kept her compliant and reliable during the pandemic's early months. Back at sea, she returned to carrier support: on January 1, 2021, she steamed abeam of USS THEODORE ROOSEVELT (CVN 71) at the start of that carrier's deployment. On May 5, 2021, she supported NORTHERN EDGE 2021, providing fuel to USS JOHN C. STENNIS and integrated units during large-scale joint training in the Gulf of Alaska. On October 22, 2021, she refueled USS HOWARD (DDG 83) in the eastern Pacific during the destroyer's deployment.

USNS GUADALUPE began 2022 with a heavy 7th Fleet logistics tempo tied to ABRAHAM LINCOLN (CVN 72) Carrier Strike Group movements and other independent deployers. On January 6, 2022, she conducted an UNREP with USS MOBILE BAY in the Pacific, then on February 4 fueled USS SPRUANCE (DDG 111) in the Philippine Sea as ABRAHAM LINCOLN's group settled into theater operations. Six days later, on February 10, she ran a replenishment with USS RALPH JOHNSON (DDG 114) in the South China Sea, and on February 15 made a brief logistics stop at Sembawang, Singapore, before continuing tasking. Through the summer she supported unit-level workups and patrols, including a vertical replenishment with USS GRIDLEY (DDG 101) (posted August 6) and an UNREP sequence with USS CHARLESTON (LCS 18) (posted September 2). As NIMITZ's deployment began in December, GUADALUPE fueled destroyers screening the carrier - e.g., USS DECATUR (DDG 73) on December 13 - and then NIMITZ itself on December 14 as the strike group pushed west.

In early 2023 GUADALUPE remained embedded in NIMITZ CSG operations across the Philippine Sea. On January 7, she steamed alongside NIMITZ for a replenishment-at-sea, and on January 11 refueled DECATUR again while the destroyer maneuvered in close station during RAS approaches. As the deployment matured into spring, photographic logs document a replenishment with NIMITZ on April 10 and a May 12 UNREP with USS ANCHORAGE (LPD 23) while the MAKIN ISLAND (LHD 8) ARG and NIMITZ CSG crisscrossed Western Pacific exercise boxes and sea lanes supporting activities such as BALIKATAN 2023 and allied presence operations centered on the Philippines.

In 2024, the ship balanced routine operations with people and material readiness. On March 15, 2024, Military Sealift Command Pacific hosted "Coffee with the Commodore" for Sea-Year cadets embarked in MSC oilers - specifically noting cadets aboard USNS PECOS (T-AO 197) and USNS GUADALUPE - underscoring the ship's parallel role as a training platform for future licensed officers. The Navy then awarded a mid-term availability to Vigor Marine in Portland: work began August 20, 2024, and was planned to complete November 3, 2024, covering required inspections, preservation, and reliability work to set conditions for the next deployment cycle.

GUADALUPE returned to sustained forward operations in 2025. In the Sea of Japan, she refueled USS RALPH JOHNSON on March 10 during combined 7th Fleet operations, and five days later, on March 15, conducted a refueling-at-sea with USS CARL VINSON (CVN 70) as CSG-1 maneuvered in the region. Related imagery from escorts confirms GUADALUPE's station with the group that week. As global tasking shifted mid-year, she rendezvoused with NIMITZ in the U.S. Central Command area, executing a replenishment-at-sea on June 24, 2025 during NIMITZ's westward movement from the South China Sea. On June 23, she also fueled the newly commissioned destroyer USS LENAH SUTCLIFFE HIGBEE (DDG 123) during its WESTPAC deployment. After returning to San Diego in early August, Military Sealift Command highlighted the deployment's scale: nearly 30,000 nautical miles steamed; about 30 million gallons of ship and aviation fuel delivered; roughly 800 pallets of dry stores moved across 33 at-sea replenishments - support provided to CARL VINSON and NIMITZ strike groups and to the Royal Navy's HMS PRINCE OF WALES during its Indo-Pacific period.

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USNS GUADALUPE Image Gallery:

The photo below was taken by Stefan Karpinski and shows the GUADALUPE underway in Middle East waters in support of Operation Enduring Freedom in 2003.

The photos below were taken by me and show the GUADALUPE at Naval Base San Diego, Calif., on March 10, 2008.

The photo below was taken by me and shows the GUADALUPE at Naval Air Station North Island, San Diego, Calif., on March 26, 2010.

The photos below were taken by me and show the GUADALUPE arriving at San Francisco, Calif., for Fleet Week 2011 on October 8, 2011.

The photo below was taken by Sebastian Thoma and shows the GUADALUPE at Naval Air Station North Island, San Diego, Calif., on January 9, 2016.

The photos below were taken by Michael Jenning and show the GUADALUPE arriving at Naval Air Station North Island, Calif., on April 19, 2016.

The photos below were taken by Michael Jenning and show the GUADALUPE at the Naval Fuel Farm at San Diego, Calif., on December 28, 2021. The last photo shows her at Naval Air Station North Island, Calif., later that day.

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