Loved ones anxious as strike group heads to sea

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It was doubly hard for their parents and spouses, who wondered whether the ships were headed to the Persian Gulf and Iraq.

They got no answers from the brass.

In a brief news conference before the battle group's 10 a.m. departure, Navy Capt. Jonathan Padfield said he had not been told the ships' destination. Padfield said yesterday's deployment was a regular rotation, and the group was going as the Peleliu Expeditionary Strike Group.

Led by the amphibious assault ship Peleliu, the convoy comprises the amphibious ships Pearl Harbor and Dubuque, the cruiser Cape St. George and the destroyers Halsey and Benfold.

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