CCGS Amundsen is a Pierre Radisson-class icebreaker and Arctic research vessel operated by the Canadian Coast Guard. The vessel entered service in 1979 as Franklin and was renamed Sir John Franklin in 1980 and served as such until 1996. Declared surplus, the vessel was used as an accommodation ship in Labrador in 1996 and placed in reserve in 2000. In 2003, the ship was reactivated and underwent conversion to an Arctic research vessel. The ship recommissioned as Amundsen.
USCGC Acushnet (WMEC-167) was a cutter of the United States Coast Guard, homeported in Ketchikan, Alaska. She was originally USS Shackle (ARS-9), a Diver-class rescue and salvage ship commissioned by the United States Navy for service in World War II. She was responsible for coming to the aid of stricken vessels and received three battle stars during World War II, before a long career with the Coast Guard. Acushnet patrolled the waters of the North Pacific and was one of the last World War II era ships on active duty in the US fleet upon her retirement in 2011.
USCGC Chase (WHEC-718) was a Hamilton class High Endurance Cutter of the United States Coast Guard. She was laid down on October 26, 1966 at Avondale Shipyards in New Orleans, launched on May 20, 1967 and commissioned on March 11, 1968. Chase is the fourth of twelve Hamilton Class, 378-foot (115 m) cutters, and the third cutter named in honor of Salmon Portland Chase. She was decommissioned on March 29, 2011 and transferred to the Nigerian Navy as an excess defense article under the Foreign Assistance Act as NNS Thunder (F90).
Arctic Sunrise is an ice-strengthened vessel operated by Greenpeace. The vessel was built in 1975 and has a gross tonnage of 949, a length of 50.5 metres (166 ft) and a maximum speed of 13 knots. She is classified by Det Norske Veritas as a "1A1 icebreaker".
The United States Coast Guard carries out three basic roles, which are further subdivided into eleven statutory missions. The three roles are:
USCGC Sherman (WHEC-720) was a United States Coast Guard Hamilton-class high endurance cutter named for John Sherman, the 32nd United States Secretary of the Treasury and author of the Sherman Antitrust Act.
USCGC Valiant (WMEC-621) is a United States Coast Guard medium endurance cutter, in service since 1967.
USCGC Resolute (WMEC-620) is a United States Coast Guard medium endurance cutter.
USCGC Venturous (WMEC-625) is a United States Coast Guard medium endurance cutter.
The USCGC Oak (WLB-211) is a United States Coast Guard seagoing buoy tender, the second of her name and the eleventh of the Juniper-class. Home-ported in Newport, Rhode Island the ship tends buoys along the Northeastern U.S. coast. The Oak also performs other duties, such as maritime border security, marine environmental protection, maritime law enforcement, search and rescue, and domestic icebreaking. She is also responsible for maintenance support of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) National Data Buoy Center's offshore weather buoys.
USS Anacostia (AO-94) was a Escambia-class replenishment oiler acquired by the United States Navy for use during World War II. She had the dangerous but necessary task of providing fuel to vessels in combat and non-combat areas. She served in the Pacific Ocean Theater of operations late in the war, and returned home proudly with one battle star.
Piracy in the Gulf of Guinea affects a number of countries in West Africa as well as the wider international community. By 2011, it had become an issue of global concern. Pirates in the Gulf of Guinea are often part of heavily armed criminal enterprises, who employ violent methods to steal oil cargo. In 2012, the International Maritime Bureau, Oceans Beyond Piracy and the Maritime Piracy Humanitarian Response Program reported that the number of vessels attacks by West African pirates had reached a world high, with 966 seafarers attacked during the year. According to the Control Risks Group, pirate attacks in the Gulf of Guinea had by mid-November 2013 maintained a steady level of around 100 attempted hijackings in the year, a close second behind Southeast Asia.
United States Coast Guard Station Woods Hole is a United States Coast Guard station located in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. The station is home to Sector Southeast New England.
USCGC Woodrush (WLB-407) was a buoy tender that performed general aids-to-navigation (ATON), search and rescue (SAR), and icebreaking duties for the United States Coast Guard (USCG) from 1944 to 2001 from home ports of Duluth, Minnesota and Sitka, Alaska. She responded from Duluth at full speed through a gale and high seas to the scene of the SS Edmund Fitzgerald sinking in 1975. In 1980, she took part in a rescue rated in the top 10 USCG rescues when she helped to save the passengers and crew of the cruise ship Prinsendam after it caught fire in position 57°38"N 140° 25"W then while being towed sank off Graham Island, British Columbia. She was one of the first vessels to respond to the Exxon Valdez oil spill in 1989. She was decommissioned on 2 March 2001 and sold to the Republic of Ghana to serve in the Ghana Navy.
The Deployable Operations Group (DOG) was a United States Coast Guard command that provided properly equipped, trained and organized Deployable Specialized Forces (DSF) to Coast Guard, DHS, DoD and inter-agency operational and tactical commanders. Formerly headquartered in Arlington, Virginia, it was established on 20 July 2007, and was commanded by a captain and was decommissioned by the Commandant of the Coast Guard, Admiral Robert Papp on 1 October 2013. Although many of the units existed long before the 2007 commissioning. Upon decommissioning, the units previously assigned to the DOG were split between Coast Guard Pacific and Atlantic Area commands.
The 2010 Port Arthur oil spill was the result of a collision between two vessels in the Sabine-Neches Waterway at Port Arthur, Texas on January 23, 2010. The two vessels were the oil tanker Eagle Otome and a barge being pushed by the towboat Dixie Vengeance.
Pacific Responder is a Responder-class oil-skimming vessel registered in Norfolk, Virginia and based in San Francisco, California.
United States Coast Guard Air Station Houston is a United States Coast Guard Air Station located 15 miles (24 km) southeast of downtown Houston, Texas on board the Ellington Field Joint Reserve Base (JRB).
USCGC Aspen (WLB-208) is the eighth cutter in the Juniper-class 225 ft (69 m) of seagoing buoy tenders. She is under the operational control of the Commander of the Eleventh Coast Guard District and is home-ported at Yerba Buena Island in San Francisco, California. Her primary area of responsibility is the coastal waters, river bars and high seas from the California-Oregon border to San Diego, California. Aspen conducts heavy lift aids-to-navigation operations, and law enforcement, homeland security, environmental pollution response, and search and rescue as directed.
Samuel Q. Brown was a steam tanker built in 1920–1921 by Merchant Shipbuilding Corporation of Chester for Tide Water Oil Co., a subsidiary of Standard Oil, with intention of operating between New York and oil-producing ports of the southern United States and Mexico. The ship was named after Samuel Queen Brown, one of the founders of Tide Water Pipe Co. and former president of the Chester Oil Company.
