The U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Mellon (WHEC 717) and crew patrol along the Maritime Boundary Line between the U.S. and Russia in the Bering Sea, Alaska, May 25, 2018. The crew kept a lookout for illegal encroachments of the U.S. Exclusive Economic Zone by foreign fishing vessels. U.S. Coast Guard photo by Petty Officer 1st Class Bill Colclough.

Lookouts of The Last Frontier

The Coast Guard Cutter Mellon, homeported in Seattle, and its 180 crew members embark every year on their Alaskan patrol from Dutch Harbor, Alaska, the nation’s top fishing port. The Mellon and its crew divide their patrols between the Pacific Ocean adjacent to Mexico and Guatemala. In the Eastern Pacific, offshore South America, the crew interdicts drug smugglers in the Joint Interagency Task Force – South area of responsibility.

In the Bering Sea, the Mellon crew keeps a lookout for mariners in distress and enforces laws and regulations related to the preservation of U.S. fisheries stocks.


Your Coast Guard in 2011 – Alaska

With an increasing number of eyes on the Arctic, Coast Guardsmen spent 2011 testing capabilities, building partnerships and rapport with Native Alaskans and keeping a vigilant watch above the Arctic Circle in some of the most challenging marine operation environments on the planet.