EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The USS Abraham Lincoln returned to base following an epic 286-day deployment at sea.
USS Abraham Lincoln Comes Home After 286 Straight Days at Sea, Two hundred eighty-six days. That's how long USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN-72) went without a single port call, a streak that ended with a stop in Thailand on September 2.
- On October 8, she finally returned to Naval Air Station North Island.Lincoln left San Diego on November 21, 2025, on what families expected to be a deployment of roughly six months. The war with Iran changed those plans. She and Carrier Air Wing 9 were sent to the Middle East, where the strike group supported Operation Epic Fury.The numbers speak for themselves. Seventy-two replenishments at sea. More than 13,000 flights. About 28,500 flight hours. Roughly 5,000 sailors and Marines aboard.Here's what often gets overlooked. The reactors weren't the limiting factor. A nuclear carrier can operate for decades without refueling its reactors. The real challenge is keeping everything else going: the crew, spare parts, food, and supplies. Those 72 replenishments were essential to keeping the carrier operational throughout the deployment.Lincoln has been through a long deployment before. In 2019 and 2020, she spent 295 days deployed, at the time the longest post-Cold War deployment of its kind, before arriving in San Diego as her new homeport. USS Gerald R. Ford, which returned earlier this year after 326 days away, has spent even longer at sea in the modern era.Welcome home, Lincoln.
