On Friday, officials expect to begin assessing the extent of damage to service members' vehicles and household goods as a result of a fire aboard the transport ship MV Courage, defense officials said.
Sarah Garner, spokeswoman for the Surface Deployment and Distribution Command, said that as of Wednesday morning, troops with a private vehicle or household goods shipment aboard the vessel had been notified. Once the damage assessment is complete, they'll get a follow-up notification, she said.
The ship arrived in Bremerhaven, Germany, early Wednesday, and is being inspected by German authorities. That inspection is expected to take 24 to 36 hours. Once that's done, and depending on the results of the inspection, the cargo will be offloaded and the damage assessment will begin, Garner said.
According to SDDC, 461 privately owned vehicles and 204 household goods shipments were aboard the MV Courage.
Of those, 419 POVs were going from Bremerhaven to the continental U.S. and 42 were en route from continental U.S. to Southampton, England. Of the household goods shipments, 160 were headed from Antwerp, Belgium, and Bremerhaven to the continental U.S., and 44 were headed from continental U.S. to Southampton.
A fire erupted on the ship June 2 while it was in transit between Bremerhaven and Southampton. The crew engaged the CO2 system on one of the storage decks and the vessel arrived safely at Southampton, where officials determined it was seaworthy and allowed it to return to Bremerhaven.
The cause of the fire has not been determined.
Normal claims procedures will be followed for damaged POVs and household goods shipments, Garner said.
Karen has covered military families, quality of life and consumer issues for Military Times for more than 30 years, and is co-author of a chapter on media coverage of military families in the book "A Battle Plan for Supporting Military Families." She previously worked for newspapers in Guam, Norfolk, Jacksonville, Fla., and Athens, Ga.
