What is the nature of Sea Swap?
Sea Swap is a crew deployment concept that rotates different crews on a ship stationed overseas without bringing the ship back to its U.S. homeport. This procedure allows the Navy to get the equivalent of four operational tours in the region with one ship and three crews. Sea Swap fleet experiments have included swapping a fourth crew aboard USS Fletcher (DD 992) and a third crew aboard USS Higgins (DDG 76). Sea Swap has demonstrated a more efficient deployment concept and saved millions of dollars in transit fuel costs. Sea Swap also increased the availability of these ships on-station without lengthening crew deployments.
