Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Karl Schultz visits with Coast Guard crews stationed in New York City. U.S. Coast Guard photo illustration by Petty Officer 1st Class Jetta Disco.

The Marine Technology Reporter has a short article about Admiral Schultz, largely based on an interview. It is primarily concerned with the Coast Guard’s relationship to the larger Maritime Industry and Infrastructure.

Keeping the commercial maritime waterways humming means business for the subsea community, and a quick ‘by the numbers’ look at the U.S. maritime industry is enlightening and puts the Commandant’s mission in perspective: 95,000 miles of shoreline, 25,000 miles of navigable channels, 361 ports, 50,000 federal aids to navigation, cumulatively support more than 30 million jobs and $5.4 trillion in economic activity.

The Commandant also discussed the cyber threat and what the Coast Guard is doing about it.

“Think about automated ships and facilities. With those automated ships and facilities comes risk, technical and cyber risk. With all of the technology comes increased vulnerability. We’re building out our cyber capability at the Coast Guard. I have about 300 positions today on cyber at the Coast Guard, and the 2020 budget has about another 60 bodies as we have to defend Coast Guard networks from attack and we have to bring a cyber regulatory face to the waterfront. We need to build our own technical experts in this area” and to that end there is a new cyber major at the Coast Guard Academy, with the class of 2022 being the first with graduates with a cyber degree.

Thanks to Lee for bringing this to my attention.