Artists rendering from Eastern Shipbuilding Group
Below is a Coast Guard Headquarters news release reproduced in its entirety, announcing two Off Shore Patrol Cutters (OPCs) will be homeported at Newport. That the first two OPCs would be based in San Pedro (Long Beach) and the second pair in Kodiak has already been announced, so presumably these are numbers five and six. These would be the first OPCs based on the East Coast, and also the first of the OPCs completed under the not yet awarded second construction contract. Delivery is expected in FY2026 and 2027.
Ultimately I would expect that most basing locations would ultimate support at least three ships. There seems to be a trend in this direction, and it makes sense for engineering and technical support. It also seems to follow a trend of the Coast Guard moving into moorings largely vacated at existing or former US Navy bases, e.g. Charleston, Pensacola, and Corpus Christi.
U.S. Coast Guard announces Offshore Patrol Cutter homeport WASHINGTON – The U.S. Coast Guard announced today that Naval Station Newport, R.I. will be home to future Offshore Patrol Cutters (OPCs). “I am excited to announce the homeporting of two Offshore Patrol Cutters at Naval Station Newport, Rhode Island,” said Admiral Karl L. Schultz, Commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard. “NAVSTA Newport provides strategic operational reach and significant logistics support to our Service, helping secure our national interests in the Atlantic. I am grateful to the community and its leadership for their continued support of the U.S. Coast Guard and our families assigned to the region”. OPCs are the Coast Guard’s top acquisition priority and will provide the majority of the Coast Guard’s offshore presence, bridging the capabilities of the 418-foot National Security Cutters and the 154-foot Fast Response Cutters. OPCs will conduct missions including law enforcement, drug and migrant interdiction, search and rescue, homeland security, and defense operations. Each OPC will be capable of deploying independently or as part of a Task Group, and be capable of serving as a mobile Command and Control (C2) platform for surge operations such as hurricane, mass migration, or other contingency response operations. -USCG- |
Chuck Hill's CG Blog 
Is this the first fleet to homeport at Newport since Nixon took out the naval station?
Its a fleet?
Has there been any announcements on what units the first six OPC will replace?
No indication which specific ships, but almost certainly 210s. They may be waiting to figure out which are in worst shape. Home ports of the remaining 210s will probably be moved around. Looks like we expect to get one ship per year 2022-2028, then two ships a year, so we will continue to have 210s in the fleet for a very long time, probably to 2032. If so, the last one will be at least 63 years old if we can keep them running until then. I have my doubts.
60+ years….. that is neglet
Pingback: Coast Guard Picks First East Coast Homeport for Offshore Patrol Cutters | taktik(z) GDI (Government Defense Infrastructure)
Sad….
The choice of Newport is interesting in that I believe the current First District large cutter homeports are Kittery and Boston. Newport’s location at the entrance to Long Island Sound makes strategic sense, but does this mean no large cutters in Boston or Kittery. And increase in larger cutters based in the northeast, which seem counter to DHS momentum. Or does this instead indicate the standard plan is to homeport the Argus-class ships in pairs in a more distributed basing plan.
@Cokolman, I am also a little surprised that ships going to the 1st District would go to Newport. I would have thought Boston since we have a long history of putting numbers of ships their. The proximity to the submarine base at Groton may have something to do with the choice. The rationale for putting the first East Coast OPCs in the NE may simply be that they want to get some of the most seaworthy ships into the area where the weather is the worst. We still need to do New England fisheries and that area can be demanding.
Base Boston is too small to handle any more ships. Also the commute into that facility is terrible. Crew has to live far from there to afford decent housing. Newport is a better call for crew/family life. I am sure that the much larger size of the OPC vice 210 is going to cause many current homeports to lose their ships.
@ ropeyarns
I would think that if they based two WMSM in Boston they would replace the two WMEC currently based there.
@ Chuck
I was wondering if they are going to base these two WMSM in R.I., what base/homeport is losing ships to make up for this? What with 25 tentative WMSM replacing 28 current WMEC some homeport(s) were already going to be losing a currently based ship{s}
Pingback: Coast Guard Picks First East Coast Homeport for Offshore Patrol Cutters – JC's Navy, Military and Maritime
Pingback: Basing for Larger Patrol Cutters | Chuck Hill's CG Blog
Pingback: Coast Guard Picks First East Coast Homeport for Offshore Patrol Cutters – USNI News
Pingback: Coast Guard Picks First East Coast Homeport for Offshore Patrol Cutters - USNI News