Hospital Ships

[dewline]

I am remembering "All Good Things", the wrap-up of The Next Generation's branch of Star Trek. Specifcally, one of the "guest" starships in that episode, the hospital ship USS Pasteur as captained in an alternative future by Beverly Crusher Picard.

Well, hospital ships are a real thing in some few real-worlds wet navies. The USNS Mercy and USNS Comfort are in US service and have been for some decades. Since I was in grade school, I think.

Anyway. It's occurred to at least one naval affairs blogger that maybe more hospital ships would be a good thing for the USN to have at hand in case of future crises, domestic and overseas. Whether new-built or refitted from private hands. I would agree re: Canadian purposes as well, if we get through this current mess reasonably intact enough. If we don't need them at home, there's UN/WHO operations that could be supported, right?

But again, we have to get through this mess without being annexed by "Trumpistan" or being remade into a province of Xi Jinping's or Putin's regimes. Or bankrupted and whatever else our nightmares can dream up.

And on to whatever's next between now and the end of the first season of Picard...

Related note: https://cdrsalamander.blogspot.com/2020/03/cruise-ships-and-usnr-covid-19-public.html

Comments

[amaebi]

Oh, what a superb idea!

[cmcmck]

Military field hospital units are being prepped as backup here and private sector hospitals have been turned over to the NHS.

Every little helps.

[armiphlage]

40% of the world's population lives within 100 km of coastline, so hospital ships with integrated helicopter hangers and landing pads would be able to provide services to a lot of people.

Some of the helicopter pads could be provided with cargo container locking lugs, to be used for container transport. Add in extra fuel tanks, a cargo crane, and you'd have a combination hospital ship / replenishment vessel. Except you'd have to dismount the missile system and couldn't transport ammunition if displaying the Red Cross.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protecteur-class_auxiliary_vessel

[dewline]

Under the present circumstances, I don't see much need for the missile systems and ammo transport capacity, especially in "domestic emergency support"(?) scenarios. But I'm not a professional in these matters.

I might find myself learning more, and more quickly, anyway right now, though.

[armiphlage]

We're currently building replenishment vessels to support naval deployments and overseas land forces; they have capacity for a 45-bed hospital.

In the future, with a little design work, we could instead build hospital ship with many more beds that could also serve as a replenishment vessel.

[thewayne]

Laid down as an oil tanker?! That's a heck of a conversion!

[dewline]

Agreed on that point. Considering that a few might be on their way to becoming surplus to requirements nowadays, perhaps some market research is in order.

Alternatively, some of the comments - which seem to be viewable only to Disqus users once they've posted to another web page using Disqus for logging comments - have other ideas about what kinds of ships to convert.

[thewayne]

You wonder how much decontamination is required!

[dewline]

That is a continuing concern, yes. Other types of freighters might be preferable for newer conversions.