The aircraft carrier Harry S. Truman and its strike group deployed from Naval Station Norfolk, Virginia, on Monday, beginning what the Navy called a regularly scheduled deployment to the European theater.
But Navy flattops have undertaken anything but regular deployments in the past year.
Other East Coast carriers have seen their deployment plans uprooted by the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas, one that has repeatedly threatened to engulf the Middle East in a broader war since it began nearly a year ago.
American aircraft carriers have been at the forefront of Pentagon efforts to prevent the conflict from widening.
Fellow East Coast carrier Dwight D. Eisenhower was diverted to the Middle East last fall and spent nine months there before heading home this summer, while fellow carrier Gerald R. Ford conducted its own extended cruise in the Mediterranean Sea that ended earlier this spring.
West Coast carrier Theodore Roosevelt steamed over from the Indo-Pacific to relieve the Ike in July, and was later joined by the Abraham Lincoln.