A U.S. Navy destroyer will be named after Lt. Michael P. Murphy, the Patchogue native who was killed in Afghanistan in 2005 while seeking help for his platoon members who had come under intense fire from the Taliban, officials said yesterday.
At a ceremony on the eastern shore of Lake Ronkonkoma - on a beach previously named after Murphy, who was awarded the Medal of Honor last October - Navy Secretary Donald Winter said the keel of the destroyer would be laid in June 2009 at a shipyard in Maine and the ship commissioned in 2011.Winter said while Navy warships are traditionally named after major historical figures, the naming of the destroyer after Murphy was "an opportunity to recognize this new generation of heroes." The announcement pleased Murphy's family. "I am at a loss; what do you say?" said Murphy's father, Daniel Murphy, of Wading River. "'Thank you' seems so trivial in light of such an honor to our son."
Murphy and a four-man Navy SEAL team were on a mountainside in eastern Afghanistan trailing a Taliban leader when they were surrounded by dozens of fighters. In receiving the Medal of Honor, Murphy was cited for exposing himself to enemy fire while trying to radio for help. Murphy and two others were killed; a fourth SEAL was saved when an Afghan herder came upon him and took him to his village for safekeeping.
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