People choose to join the Navy to “see the world,” or for new adventures, or the Navy’s numerous educational benefits. Like her shipmates throughout the fleet, Airman Emily Aleiwe, a USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72) Sailor from Ogden, Utah, joined for these various opportunities. During Operation Unified Assistance (OUA), she’s experienced a hard, but valuable lesson in seeing the world, being adventurous and learning.

“I honestly didn’t know about what happened in the Indian Ocean until we pulled out of Hong Kong,” said Aleiwe. “I saw the initial reports and thought it a horrible tragedy.”

Like people throughout the world, Aleiwe and her shipmates tuned in to the news networks as the story of one of the planet’s worst natural disasters unfolded.

“Originally, the statistics were like 1,000 dead, then twenty minutes later it was 3,000,” she said. “I couldn’t believe how that number kept rising.”

As Abe headed for open waters, Navy Counselor 1st Class (SW/AW) Scott Van Riper, Aleiwe’s leading petty officer, watched along with his airman, but as a 16-year Navy veteran, he saw the bigger picture of the ship’s future.

“We’re a flexible and ready force,” said Van Riper. “When we were pulling out of Hong Kong, I was about 90-percent sure we’d head toward Southeast Asia.

“My experience is if we’re (an aircraft carrier) in the immediate area when a disaster hits, due to our self-sustainability and many humanitarian assets, we’re going to be going there.”

As Van Riper guessed, instead of heading north for operations off the Korean Peninsula, the Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group headed south to respond to one of the biggest humanitarian missions in history.

“When we were transiting, the number one question on my mind was ‘how can I help?’,” said Aleiwe.

Aleiwe gained her will “to help” from her father, Ghassan, a Kuwaiti-born citizen who immigrated to the United States in the 1970s.

“My father was in the U.S. Air Force in the 1990s and returned to his homeland for the first Gulf War,” said Aleiwe. Amidst the chaos, she said her father worked to get his parents and siblings out of the then-embattled Kuwait and sent them to the United States.

Aleiwe said her father’s selflessness didn’t stop after his service in the Air Force.

“He’s always been so giving to my siblings and I,” said