U.S. Coast Guard sector Juneau has announced the arrival of the Cutter John McCormick and its crew at Coast Guard Base Ketchikan, after completing a 6,200-mile trip from Key West, Florida.
The John McCormick is the first fast response cutter on the West Coast and will provide increased capabilities compared to the smaller 110-foot patrol boats it is replacing. ”The new cutter and its crew will provide greater service and enhanced capabilities for the southeast Alaska area and its maritime communities,” said Capt. Shannan Greene, commander of Coast Guard Sector Juneau.
The 154-foot sentinel-class cutter was named after Boatswain John McCormick who received a Gold Lifesaving Medal for his action on Mach 26, 1938. McCormick rescued Surfman Robert Bracken, who fell overboard from the motor lifeboat Triumph at the mouth of the Columbia River.
The cutter is to be commissioned on April 12.
In Seattle, on March 17, families and friends of the crew of the Seattle-based Coast Guard Cutter Polar Star, welcomed them home from a 107-day deployment to Antarctica in support of Operation Deep Freeze 2017, the U.S. military component of the National Science foundation-managed U.S. Antarctic Program.
The Polar Star’s crew provided a safe channel through more than 70 miles of thick Antarctic ice for cargo ships, facilitating the delivery of supplies to the National Science Foundation’s McMurdo and Amundsen-Scott South Pole stations on the southernmost continent.
“Maintaining a decades-old icebreaker is never easy, but our crew of more than 150 people pulled together to ensure a year’s worth of supplies and fuel safely reached McMurdo Station,” said Capt. Michael Davanzo, commanding officer of the Polar Star. Without the Coast Guard, the logistics for maintaining research operations in Antarctica would be nearly impossible.”
Polar Star made a scheduled port call in New Zealand after successfully completing oeprations in Antarctica. The crew also aided the New Zealand Defense Force and local rescue and safety personnel in their response to the Port Hills Wildfire in Christchurch, New Zealand.
Homeported in Seattle, the 399-foot long cutter weighs 13,500 tons, and uses 75,000 horsepower to muscle its way through ice up to 21-feet thick. Polar Star, built in 1973, and commissioned in 11976, is the world’s most powerful non-nuclear icebreaker. It is also the United States’ only operational heavy icebreaker capable of conducting Antarctic resupply missions.
