PLA hospital ship Peace Ark sets sail at a port in Zhoushan, East China’s Zhejiang Province, on July 3, 2023.
ZHOUSHAN, July 4 – Chinese naval hospital ship Peace Ark set sail from a military dock in Zhoushan, east China's Zhejiang Province, on July 3 to conduct Harmonious Mission 2023 in Kiribati, Tonga, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands and Timor Leste. This is the ninth Harmonious Mission for the ship Peace Ark, and the first time for Chinese naval vessel to visit Kiribati and Solomon Islands and carry out humanitarian medical services there.
According to the mission plan, the hospital ship Peace Ark will dock at the ports of Tarawa in Kiribati, Nuku'alofa in Tonga, Vila in Vanuatu, Honiara in Solomon Islands and Dili in Timor Leste. The onboard service members will carry out week-long free medical service during each port call for local people and overseas Chinese, in forms of on-board diagnosis and medical visits, to carry out common diseased, multi-morbidity diagnosis and treatment. Courtesy calls and professional exchanges will also be conducted as part of this mission.
The hospital ship for Harmonious Mission 2023 integrated totally 126 medical members from the Naval Medical University, the Joint Logistic Support Force and the navy under the PLA Eastern Theater Command, all of whom are active-duty and civilian personnel.
The ship has set up 26 clinical departments and seven auxiliary departments, which can carry out more than 40 kinds of examinations, treatments and operations in general surgery, orthopedics, obstetrics, gynecology, otorhinolaryngology and other disciplines. In addition, the ship also carries a ship-borne heliambulance to carry out emergency rescues.
The Peace Ark is China's first institutionalized ocean-going hospital ship independently designed and built by China. Since its commission in 2008, the ship has taken the Harmonious Mission as its major mission and traveled overseas several times to carry out humanitarian medical services, visiting 43 countries and regions, serving more than 250,000 people and performing more than 1,500 surgeries, with a total voyage of over 260,000 nautical miles. It has won the collective first-class merit twice.