USS Stark: Ceremony honors 37 Mayport sailors killed in 1987 attack
A tear ran down John Prebatte's cheek as he looked over each of the names of the 37 shipmates he lost on May 17, 1987, when two Iraqi Exocet missiles pierced his U.S. Navy ship. The engineering officer second class on board the USS Stark was at his father's funeral when missiles sparked destruction on the Mayport-based ship during patrol in the Persian Gulf. That's when members of his Navy family died. But Prebatte was there for them at Monday's memorial to the Stark's dead at the Beaches Veterans Memorial Park in Atlantic Beach. "I trained all those guys," Prebatte said, getting emoti...
Source: jacksonville.com