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Sailor dies aboard carrier in Persian Gulf

A 23-year-old female sailor died onboard the deployed aircraft carrier Dwight D. Eisenhower on New Year’s Eve day.

Damage Controlman Fireman Sandra S. Grant from Linwood, N.C., was found unconscious at 11:30 a.m. Dec. 31 in her berthing area and died soon after, when all efforts to revive her failed. The ship was operating in the Persian Gulf at the time of Grant’s death.

“She died of cardiac arrest,” her father, Charles T. Grant, told Navy Times. “I’ve been told that she went to medical and reported having chest pains, but I don’t know when exactly that was.”

Navy officials have only said that that a routine investigation was conducted on the ship, and the determination was that she died of natural causes. Charles Grant said that a complete autopsy was conducted in Dover, Del., though he had not been told what the results were.

Grant said he had been notified by the Navy on Sunday of his daughter’s death, and since then had been accompanied by two chief petty officers.

“They’ve been quite helpful, really,” Grant said. “I’m honored the Navy has sent them.”

Sandra Grant was raised a Navy brat; her father is a retired second class boatswain’s mate.

She was born in the Naval Hospital in Subic Bay, Philippines, on June 18, 1983 while her father was serving as a guard at the Navy brig.

Grant herself had been in the Navy since Jan. 5, 2004. She reported onboard the Eisenhower on Oct. 24, three weeks after the ship left Norfolk, Va.

“I had quite a bit to do with her decision to join the Navy,” her father said. Grant had tried striking for several ratings before settling on the engineering field and striking for damage controlman.

“She said that going into an engineering rate would help her advance quickly,” her father said. “That was her hope.”

According to the Navy Personnel Command, during her two years in the Navy, Grant had also served onboard the carrier George Washington and the destroyer Oscar Austin at sea and twice at the Transient Personnel Unit in Norfolk. Before reporting onboard the Eisenhower, she had been stationed at the Navy Legal Office, Mid Atlantic in Norfolk.

She was promoted to seaman Oct. 16, 2004 and was designated as a damage controlman fireman in June 2006.

Grant is survived by her parents Charles T. and Salvacion Belmonte Grant of Lexington, N.C.; her husband, John Wolfgang Fry; and an 8-month-old son, Alexander.