By RICHARD R. BURGESS
Managing Editor
The Coast Guard
has fulfilled a promise made two years ago to name a cutter after its
first chief journalist, the late Pulitzer Prize-winning author Alex Haley.
The former Navy salvage and rescue ship Edenton (ATS 1) has been
converted into a 282-foot medium-endurance cutter and commissioned in the
Coast Guard as the USCGC Alex Haley (WMEC 39). The new cutter is
believed to be the first U.S. military ship named for a journalist.
Haley, famed for
his best-selling book Roots, served in the Coast Guard for 20
years, beginning in 1939 as a steward and retiring in 1959 as a chief
journalist. Haley, who started writing as a hobby, was valued by his
shipmates for his talent in "ghostwriting" love letters for
them. His writing talent was recognized with an assignment to the Coast
Guard's public affairs office in New York. After retiring from the Coast
Guard, Haley continued his writing career and also worked to promote
literacy and education. He died in 1992.
Secretary of
Transportation Rodney E. Slater was the keynote speaker at the 10 July
commissioning ceremonies at the Coast Guard Yard in Baltimore, Md. Also in
attendance were Sen. Paul Sarbanes (D-Md.), Coast Guard Commandant Adm.
James M. Loy, Haley's first wife Nannie Haley, his oldest son William
Haley, his daughter Lydia Haley, his sister Lois Butts Haley, his brother
Julius Haley, and his daughter-in-law Doris Haley (whose husband, U.S.
Ambassador to Gambia George Haley, was unable to attend).
The Edenton, converted
at the Coast Guard Yard in Baltimore, features significant upgrades in
habitability and in environmental-compliance systems, new electronics and
mechanical systems, an emergency diesel generator, and a helicopter flight
deck. Installation of a retractable helicopter hangar is planned for the
future. The conversion of the 28-year-old ship cost $20 million.
The Alex Haley
will be homeported in Kodiak, Alaska. Her primary duty will be to carry
out fisheries-enforcement and search-and-rescue missions in the Bering
Sea, Gulf of Alaska, and North Pacific.
Marinette
Marine Launches New Coastal Buoy Tender
The Coast Guard's
11th Keeper-class coastal buoy tender has been launched by Marinette
Marine Corporation in Marinette, Wis. The Harry Claiborne (WLM-561)
will be commissioned later this year and be stationed in Galveston, Texas.
The tender is named for a former keeper of the Bolivar Point Light across
the bay from Galveston.
Sponsor of the
175-foot ship and keynote speaker at the launch ceremonies was the
Honorable Nancy E. McFadden, general counsel of the U.S. Department of
Transportation. Also speaking at the 26 June ceremonies was Vice Adm.
James C. Card, vice commandant of the Coast Guard.
The Harry
Claiborne is equipped with an advanced navigation and positioning
system--which includes the global positioning system--and a z-drive
propulsion system that allow for the exact positioning of buoys even when
the tender is battling extreme wind and currents. The new tender also will
be assigned to SAR (search-and-rescue) missions and marine environmental
protection missions.
Coast
Guard Says U.S. Ports Will Stay Open for Y2K
The Coast Guard
has announced that U.S. ports will remain open on 1 January 2000, and that
the service plans to collect the information needed from port authorities
and vessel operators to ensure that the so-called Y2K (Year 2000) computer
problem does not affect maritime safety.
"Through
dedicated efforts of many people at the U.S. Coast Guard, local ports, and
private industry, the maritime transportation sector is readying itself
for the Year 2000," said Deputy Secretary of Transportation Mortimer
L. Downey. "We believe we are well on our way to having a
transportation system that will operate properly before, during, and after
the millenium change.
Rear Adm. George
N. Naccara, the Coast Guard's director of information and technology, said
that the Coast Guard is treating the Year 2000 problem with "the same
heightened state of readiness" that it would employ with other marine
hazards, such as spills and severe storms.
Navy
Deactivates Two More Patrol, Reconnaissance Units
The Navy has
deactivated two more combat squadrons, one carrier-based, the other
land-based. Patrol Squadron 91 (VP-91), a reserve P-3C squadron, and Fleet
Air Reconnaissance Squadron 5 (VQ-5), one of the Navy's two carrier-based
ES-3A squadrons, have been retired as the result of budget constraints.
VP-91, known at
various times as the Pink Panthers, Stingers, and Black Cats, was
established at Naval Air Station (NAS) Moffett Field, Calif., on 1
November 1970. For more than two decades the squadron operated, in
succession, the P-3A, P-3B, P-3B (MOD), and P-3C Update III versions of
the Orion maritime patrol aircraft. VP-91 annually provided many
detachments to the Pacific Fleet and made deployments all over the Pacific
and Indian Ocean areas, conducting such operations as tracking Soviet
submarines and detecting drug-running ships. VP-91 was the only reserve
P-3 squadron deployed in support of Operation Desert Storm in 1991, during
which one of its crews participated in the destruction of Iraqi naval
vessels.
VQ-5 was
established on 15 April 1991 to operate the ES-3A Shadow carrier-based
electronic reconnaissance aircraft, a modification of the S-3A
antisubmarine aircraft that replaced the EA-3B Skywarrior reconnaissance
aircraft that was retired after the Gulf War.
The VQ-5 Sea
Shadows initially were based at Naval Air Station Agana, Guam, but
following the closure of Agana were moved (in October 1994) to NAS North
Island in Coronado, Calif.; the squadron also maintained a two-aircraft
detachment at Naval Air Facility Misawa, Japan--that detachment usually
deployed on board the aircraft carrier forward-deployed to Japan.
VQ-5 completed 15
carrier deployments between 1993 and 1999, most of them in support of
Operation Southern Watch over Iraq.
The squadron's
final deployment--on board the Nimitz-class nuclear-powered aircraft
carrier USS Carl Vinson--brought the Sea Shadows into combat over
Iraq during Operation Desert Fox in December 1998.
The ES-3A is
being retired this year without replacement because of the expense of
upgrading the aircraft's mission suite to meet the interconnectivity
requirements of the future. Airborne signals intelligence collection
requirements for the fleet will be consolidated in the Navy's land-based
EP-3E aircraft squadrons.
Sea
Service Notes
Ceremonies
marking the closure of two Marine Corps air stations have marked
the completion of a realignment of Marine Corps aviation bases in southern
California. MCAS Tustin and MCAS El Toro, both in Orange
County, have been closed as part of the implementation of Base Realignment
and Closure Commission recommendations. The units and aircraft formerly
based at the two stations have been moved to MCAS Camp Pendleton, MCAS
Miramar--formerly a naval air station--and Edwards Air Force Base, all in
southern California.
Two Coast
Guard Hamilton-class high-endurance cutters deployed overseas this
summer in support of Navy fleet operations. The USCGC Dallas
was assigned to support U.S. Sixth Fleet operations in the Mediterranean.
The USCGC Midgett, deployed with the USS Constellation
Carrier Battle Group (CVBG), is the first Coast Guard cutter to deploy to
the Persian Gulf as an integral unit of a CVBG.
The USCGC Sumac
(WLR-311)--last river tender of her class--has been decommissioned
in St. Louis, Mo. The 115-foot tender operated from eight different bases
during its 54 years of service.
The Coast
Guard has announced that it will grant no extensions of phaseout
dates for single-hull tankers that are modified with double bottoms or
double sides unless the conversion was completed before 18 August 1990.
The Oil Pollution Act of 1990 requires the phaseout of single-hull tankers
but allows up to an additional five years for modified vessels, depending
on their configuration. No single-hull tankers will be permitted to
operate within U.S. waters after 1 January 2015.
The Maritime
Administration has accepted bids from Esco Marine and Transforma
Marine Corporation to scrap 12 obsolete vessels--seven ships in
the James River reserve fleet in Virginia and five in the reserve fleet in
Beaumont, Texas. |
