Amphibious assault ship USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD 6) completed its Command Readiness Assessment Visit (CRAV), Oct. 15, with more than 90 percent of the ship’s programs scoring the highest mark of “effective.”

CRAV is designed to assess a ship preparing for a maintenance availability, and focuses on command-wide programs not associated with a specific warfare area.

"The ship performed remarkably well on the CRAV,” said John A. Leavitt, lead CRAV assessor from Commander, Naval Surface Force, Pacific Fleet (COMNAVSURFPAC). "This is primarily due to the ship’s early engagement with the CRAV checklists and the ability of the crew to self-assess.”

It took one day for the assessors to evaluate the programs, due in part to the use of online statistics from the Naval Corporate Data Systems programs such as BUPERS Online (BOL), Navy Family Accountability and Assessment System (NFAAS) and Navy Standard Integrated Personnel System (NSIPS). There were multiple programs that required more direct, hands-on evaluations.

Twenty-one programs were assessed, with the ship’s program managers meeting with a COMNAVSURFPAC subject matter expert and going over checklists and requirements for each subject. One of the programs being evaluated was religious ministries.

"Much of what Bonhomme Richard’s religious specialists do every day is keep track of what the chaplains do,” said Capt. Mike Hakanson, COMNAVSURFPAC force chaplain and evaluator of Bonhomme Richard’s religious ministries team. "They were able to find everything they needed to give us a complete picture of what the religious ministries team has done on board BHR since the last CRAV, and Bonhomme Richard is very fortunate to have religious programs specialists who know their jobs and demonstrate the best of their rate.”

Lt. Cmdr. Nathan Desso, Bonhomme Richard’s training officer, said he was happy with the results and proud of each program manager for their day-to-day hard work, but a successful assessment does not mean the work ends.

"We never stop assessing and training,” said Desso. “CRAV is here to help us if we need it. Our commanding officer’s philosophy is ‘Ready Now, Ready Always,’ so this is something we do on a constant basis. I am confident that the inspectors and assessors could leave and come back a month later and we would still have things ready to go."

Bonhomme Richard is homeported in San Diego. Its mission is to embark, deploy and land elements of the Marine landing force in amphibious assault operations by aircraft, amphibious vehicles or any combination of these methods, as well as provide humanitarian assistance.

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