The MarineLog reports Bollinger Shipyards, Inc. has appointed former Master Chief Petty Officer of the Coast Guard, Charles “Skip” Bowen as Program Manager for the FRC “Sentinel” Class Patrol Boat building program at Bollinger’s Lockport facility. Bowen was Master Chief Petty Officer of the Coast Guard, from 2006 to 2010.
US Coast Guard photograph
Here is more evidence that laser weapons are on the way, although the video does not look that impressive. We have already seen video of lasers taking out air targets, which has to be more demanding, so the fact that lasers can start a fire on a boat should not be surprising.
What caught my attention was this statement, “Lasers can address a number of emerging threats, enabling the fleet to maintain freedom of operation, yet with a very low cost of operation. Lasers will offset the use of higher cost kinetic defenses for a number of these threats, substantially reducing the total cost of ship defense.” –Lasers are the low cost option?
The press release says that the system, “tracked and damaged moving, remotely piloted, unmanned small boats traveling at representative speeds and ranges.” In the video the boat’s engines appear to be idling, there is no attempt at evasion, and the range is not stated. Also the clip does not appear to be continuous, so the time required is not clear. Even apparently edited, it takes some time before the fire breaks out. Presumably the fire was only as large as it was because the engines were running, bringing gasoline to the fire.
Still, I can see some circumstances where a weapon that can be turned down to less than lethal settings, and be applied very precisely, might be useful.
Lasers do seem to have a future within the lifetime of the ships the Coast Guard is planning now. Perhaps it would be prudent to make sure that they have the electrical generating capacity to use these weapons. This seems another reason to look closely at diesel electric or at least hybrid propulsion for the Offshore Patrol Cutters. As the captain of the Starship Enterprise might say, the command may be, “Divert power to the shields.”
Here is a UAV that is already in use by the Navy. The ScanEagle, is so small it could operate routinely from the Webber Class WPCs.
Wing Span 10.25 ft (3.12m)
Length 6.5 ft (1.98m)
Max Take Off Weight 44-48.5 lb. (22 kg)
Max speed 80 knots
Cruise speed 50 knots
Ceiling 10,000 ft
Max endurance: 15 hours
In it’s “dual bay” configuration the sensor package can include a synthetic aperture imaging radar in addition to video. It can use standard diesel fuel, but it won’t use much since the engine is less than two horsepower.
It was reportedly used during the Maersk Alabama piracy incident in April 2009 (the first of three times pirates attempted to take the ship).
I think its worth a closer look, like perhaps a deployment on a 210.
The first African-American woman to join the Coast Guard in 1945, Olivia Hooker, 96 (she retired at age 87), provided some prospective as she met with service men and women of the current generation. “I have seen a lot of progress,” check out her story here.
Yesterday was a bad day for the Libyan Coast Guard (here, here, and here). You have to have some sympathy for sailors who find themselves so over-matched, the largest vessel was smaller than a 110, but we can also recall that Qaddafi’s forces also tried to attack the US Coast Guard using SCUD missiles in 1986.
On the subject of “What Does It Take to Sink a Ship?”, this approximately 106 foot long, 116 ton vessel was hit by missile with a 300 pound warhead and still it managed to limp to shore, where it beached itself.
The Acquisition Directorate has given us another illustration of an OPC conceptual design, apparently the same design used earlier.
Acquisition Directorate’s Disclaimer: “The conceptual renderings posted on this website are for artistic display purposes only and do not convey any particular design, Coast Guard design preferences, or other requirements for the OPC.”
We should see a draft “Request for Proposal” (RFP) in the next three months.
Meanwhile the list of companies interested in building the ships has grown to twelve: Austal, BAE, Bath Iron Works, Bollinger, Derecktor, Eastern Ship Building Group, Marinette Marine, General Dynamics NASSCO, Northrop Grumman, Todd Pacific, Signal International, and VT Halter Marine. (Click on “List of Interested Companies” here for more detail).
A previous more detailed update from November 2010 here.
Marines Blog, the official blog of the US Marine corps reports, “The U.S. Senate passed a resolution on March 7, 2011, declaring March 30 ‘Welcome Home Vietnam Veterans Day.’ The resolution currently awaits a decision by the House. This day will be recognized across the U.S. as a day of commemoration, a day to pay the proper respect to the veterans who sacrificed so much during the war.”
A bit overdue, the entire post is worth a read.
The Military Sealift Command (MSC) has changed some of their organizational titles, apparently without any real change in organization. Here are the changes.
| Former Name | New Name |
| Sealift Logistics Command Atlantic (SEALOGLANT) | Military Sealift Command Atlantic (MSCLANT) |
| Sealift Logistics Command Pacific (SEALOGPAC) | Military Sealift Command Pacific (MSCPAC) |
| Sealift Logistics Command Europe (SEALOGEUR) | Military Sealift Command Europe and Africa (MSCEURAF) |
| Sealift Logistics Command Central (SEALOGCENT) | Military Sealift Command Central (MSCCENT) |
| Sealift Logistics Command Far East (SEALOGFE) | Military Sealift Command Far East (MSCFE) |
“In addition, MSC’s six ship support units now carry “MSC” before their command names: For instance, Ship Support Unit San Diego is now Military Sealift Command Ship Support Unit San Diego, or MSC SSU San Diego. MSC’s five other ship support units are in Naples, Bahrain, Singapore, Guam and Yokohama.”
We have been assured that, “This name change is the result of an extensive strategic communication effort led by MSC headquarters.”
As the Coast Guard builds it’s Acquisitions Directorate it may be useful to consider some ship building history. It’s almost two years old now, but Norman Friedman reflected on the “creative tension” that once characterized both American and British naval ship building in the July 2008 issues of USNI proceedings.
“In the past, warship procurement was very much a triangular process, marked by what might be called creative tension. The points of the triangle were the operational navy, the professional in-house designers, and the programmers responsible for paying for the fleet. Typically the operational navy (Office of the Chief of Naval Operations or OPNAV in our Navy) thought of what it would like, without much feeling for the technological (or cost) implications of what it wanted. Its ideas were reflected in tentative (“single-sheet”) ship characteristics. The Preliminary Design section of Naval Sea Systems Command sketched a corresponding ship. In effect it estimated what the stated requirements would cost and whether they were practicable at all. Continue reading
The Navy Times reports President Obama is planning to give the commencement address at the Coast Guard Academy Class of 2011 graduation ceremony on May 18.
You can see last year’s West Point commencement address here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KAMbwcBupEY&feature=related
The president’s address begins at minute 3:20.
Chuck Hill's CG Blog 