Shutter Shootout Sweet 16
The Sweet 16 round of March Madness is here! That means we’ve entered the next round of “Shutter Shootout” – your chance to select the Coast Guard photo of the year. Throughout the past year, Coast Guard members, families and fans from around the world captured remarkable photographs of rescues, patrols, operations and training days to take you behind the scenes of life in the U.S. Coast Guard.
Coast Guard sentinels to continue Hawaiian watch
The 23-year-old Kiska, homeported on the Big Island of Hawaii, is one of two Island-class patrol boats in the Hawaiian Islands. The second, Coast Guard Cutter Galveston Island, is homeported in Honolulu. Since the 1980s, the 20-person crews aboard these vessels have conducted search and rescue, law enforcement and environmental protection missions throughout the Hawaiian Islands and the Pacific.
Not just a surfman’s world
Just like any position in the U.S. Coast Guard, women can serve – and surf – as surfman. As the nation reflects on the role women have played in forming our great nation, Compass traveled to the National Motor Life Boat School in Ilwaco, Wash., to hear from women surfman on how they came to be elite boat drivers.
Shutter Shootout 2nd Round
The votes are in as we move on to the second round of tournament play in “Shutter Shootout” and get closer to selecting the best Coast Guard photo of the year. We scoured the past year’s photos and the ones with the most “likes” on Facebook made the cut. Did your favorite photo make it to the next round? Head over to our Facebook page for voting!
Shipmate of the Week – BM2 Chris Ouellette
Petty Officer 2nd Class Chris Ouellette was fresh out of boot camp in July 2007 when he was assigned to Station Grays Harbor. He arrived at his first Coast Guard unit ready to learn. Fast forward to today and Ouellette has more than just learned; he has mastered. Ouellette has earned the title of Coast Guard surfman No. 473. Along with his title of surfman, he has also earned the unofficial title of “seaman to surfman” at Grays Harbor – meaning he arrived at the unit a seaman and will be leaving a surfman.
Shutter Shootout First Round
March Madness has arrived! With brackets on everyone’s minds, we bring you our own tournament in the form of “Shutter Shootout” – your chance to select the Coast Guard photo of the year. We scoured the past year’s photos and the ones with the most “likes” on Facebook made the cut. Now it’s your turn to decide the best! Will it be a Cinderella story this year?
1 day, 3 missions, 4 lives saved
It was a week after Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Bob Papp had given his State of the Coast Guard address. Capt. Joseph P. Kelly, commanding officer of Air Station Elizabeth City, had set aside an afternoon for all-hands training to watch the speech and reflect on themes from the address. In the two hours surrounding the scheduled training time, however, the SAR alarm had sounded. Not once, but three times. In a period of just a few short hours crews would launch out of Air Station Elizabeth City one after the other. By day’s end four lives would be saved.
Sentinel of the light
The origin of Women’s History Month as a national celebration began nearly 120 years before the first Hispanic-American woman served in the Coast Guard and its predecessor services. Maria Mestre de los Dolores Andreu assumed the watch as the lighthouse keeper at the St. Augustine Lighthouse after her husband, Juan, passed away in 1859. With a yearly salary of $400 she not only became the first Hispanic-American woman to serve in the Coast Guard but also to command a federal shore installation.
Fixers & flyers
A rescue swimmer jumping from a helicopter to make a life-saving rescue is often the first image that comes to mind when one thinks of Coast Guard aviation; but what is missing from that picture is the hard work and efforts that happen behind the scenes. Coast Guard avionics electrical technicians are the unsung heroes of life saving at air stations nationwide. When an aircraft has an electrical mishap, avionics electrical technicians are on the task and at their best!
A day on the Bering: Nothing ‘routine’ about it
Forty miles southwest of the Pribilof Islands, Coast Guard Cutter Munro navigated shifting ice fields to close on the Bering Sea’s largest fishing fleet. Arctic winds whipped through the bridge’s opened door at sunrise while crewmembers cleaved ice on the forecastle and engineers looked over the ready boat to make sure its systems wouldn’t freeze up. These frozen conditions don’t sound ideal for most people. Then again, most people aren’t crewmembers aboard Munro.
