While enjoying a day on the East River, looking at the tugboats and whatnot, I saw a very friendly-looking Coast Guard ship.
Hi Coasties!
But then I realized that that’s an element of the Defense forces: serious business.
Nowadays, when they’re on station tooling around Manhattan, what are their ships and what is their armament, including, say, machine guns and personal weapons?
And I wondered what ships and if ramped-up armament was summoned in the immediate response to the 9/11 attacks. Any sources or general comments?
I can say that the Navy mustered some pretty heavy duty fire-power in the wake of 9/11, but finding out what that was is left as an exercise for the seeker of knowledge.
Coasties in the Harbor/East River/Hudson CAN carry M2HB .50 cal and/or M240B 7.62mm (.308 cal) medium machine guns, most likely the M240s. What they may or may not have below decks or in a weapons locker may have more punch.
FWIW back in oh 1971 or so I was picked up by a CG vessel when our fishing boat ran aground. It was 80’ or so long and had a 50 Cal mounted on the foredeck.
The personnel were not armed, but I can’t say if they had weapons on board.
Patrol vessels down to the size of speedboats most certainly show teeth on the Potomac in DC to this day. Of course just after 9/11 I remember the Patriot missile batteries along the river, so a machine gun on a boat doesn’t really spark much notice here.
Just like in the branches of the military (Coast Guard falls under Homeland Security but you get the idea) different units have different jobs. I can’t say for certain that there a no weapons on any Coast Guard ship but certainly rescue boats are not heavily armed. What you saw was probably part of a Port Security Unit. As the name states they are there for security at ports. I’m sure they’ll lend a hand if someone is in distress but that is not their main function. I have dealt with guys from PSUs in several places. All I’ll say is it wasn’t in the US. When you join the Coast Guard they don’t tell you what coast you will be guarding.
Yes that was a typo. However I know that you know, they have a unique status. During peacetime they are not under the Department of Defense, they are part of the Department of Homeland Security. They can be placed under the Department of the Navy when needed. They perform multiple roles beyond what the military can. Their unique status allows them to act as law enforcement without violating posse comitatus. As well as being a federal regulatory agency.
Regarding the video cited above. According to Wiki, the water rescue of that day was estimated at well over 500,000 people, the largest in history, surpassing in eight hours the number in the Dunkirk evacuation in 11 days.
I ran into a tugboat captain a few years ago. He said that he was told to pick up and carry there thousands (I can’t remember how many thousands) of body bags. Another sad detail.
Not New York, but Coast Guard in Chicago during the NATO summit were armed. I’ll leave it for the board experts to say what sort of gun that it.
A few years ago, I was looking at the tall ships festival in Chicago and saw the same sort of armed Coast Guard boats patrolling around. I don’t know if they’re always around or just for event security.
When I’ve been in New York Harbor lately, I’ve seen small USCG patrol boats like the one pictured in Jophiel’s link (I believe I’ve seen some that size and some a little bigger) patrolling off the Battery and up the East River. They typically have a Coastie in helmet and flack jacket manning the bow-mounted machine gun.
The boats you both picture/mention is a newish CoastGuard Defender class boat, i just learned. It wasn’t the one i saw, which was more, you know, boat-y. My knowledge of seafaring is not of the highest.
