CRAIG T. KOJIMA / CKOJIMA@STARBULLETIN.COM
The aircraft carrier USS Nimitz arrived at Pearl Harbor yesterday on its way home to San Diego. On the pier, Jessie Farnham hugged a family friend, Kathy Fisher. At left is Farnham's sister, Danielle Farnham.
Carrier Nimitz
docks at PearlSan Diego-area fires
alarm sailors returning
from Iraq war duty
Yoko Conniff was torn.
Conniff was relieved that her son-in-law, Petty Officer Justin Tate, would finally be back on American soil after nearly eight months as a helicopter crew member on the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz in the war against Iraq.
But at the same time, Conniff was worried about her home in the San Diego suburb of Mira Mesa and her golden retriever-Labrador mix, 10-year-old Kuma, and her two cats because of wildfires in the San Diego region.
"I just talked to my neighbors," said Conniff, who has lived in San Diego for the past 27 years, "and they said we don't have to evacuate yet. But they said that some of their other neighbors have already left.
"Everyone I talked to said that this fire is getting bad. That's what everybody is saying."
At midmorning yesterday, as she and her family watched, the 97,000-ton aircraft carrier slid next to Pearl Harbor's Hotel pier. Capt. Robert Gilman, who commands the Nimitz, said since the California fires started, he has tried to keep his crew and members of the air wing on the aircraft carrier -- based in San Diego -- informed by periodically downloading news reports and posting them on the ship's Web site.
"We're not anticipating changing the ship's schedule. We're on track," said Gilman.
The Nimitz is scheduled to be home in San Diego on Nov. 5.
He said the Navy is helping a couple hundred sailors from the Nimitz who want to leave Pearl Harbor immediately to get home by finding them commercial airline flights. The Nimitz and several ships from its battle group will be here until Friday.
In San Diego the Navy has already found shelter for more than 2,000 families who have been forced to flee their homes because of the fires, Gilman said. Temporary shelters have been set up at three San Diego naval bases as well as on several of its vessels, like the hospital ship Mercy.
The Nimitz battle group, which includes the guided-missile cruiser USS Princeton and the combat support ship USS Bridge, left San Diego on March 3. They will be here until Friday. On Sunday the Pearl Harbor-based USS Chosin, another Nimitz battle group member, returns home.
During its eight-month deployment, the Nimitz was one of four aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf. However, during the last five months of its deployment, Gilman said the Nimitz was "the only carrier providing the close air support for the Army and the Marine Corps troops on the ground in Iraq."
Petty Officer Joanne Lee, an information systems technician from Camp Smith, said "the low point of the deployment was just being away from my family."
"Other than that," the 1994 Kaiser High School graduate added, "it wasn't that bad. Time passed a lot quicker than I had expected."
