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Log Books of the U.S. Revenue Service/Coast Guard, 19th and 20th Centuries USCGC Northwind General description, specifications and time line |
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USCGC Northwind (USCG Photo, click images to enlarge) |
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Type and Characteristics - Diesel-electric cutter, one of seven Wind-class, WAGB-282, built by Western Pipe & Steel Co, Los Angeles, CA at cost of $9,880,000, laid down 10 July 1944, launched 25 February 1945, commissioned in USCG 28 July 1945, 6,515 tons displacement full load, 269ft long x 63ft beam x 29ft draft, 13.4kts, originally armed with 4-5in/12-40mm/6-20mm/depth charges/Hedgehog, 219 crew - 12 officers, 2 warrant officers, 205 men (1967).
Log Period and Areas of Service: 1945-89, Antarctica, Arctic, points in between.
Summary of Service
1945-73 - Stationed at Seattle, WA for polar ice operations and Bering Sea Patrol.
1945-46 - Temporarily stationed at Boston, MA for special US Navy operations.
1946-47- Took part in Antarctic Operation High Jump.
May-August 1948 - Carried out Bering Sea Patrol, the first in eight years. Another patrol was carried out in 1953.
12 July-29 September 1954 - Took part in joint US-Canadian Beaufort Sea Exploration.
February-April 1955 - Bering Sea scientific expedition.
July-September 1955 - Supported Distant Early Warning (DEW) Line operations.
1956-1980 - Took part in at least three Deep Freeze operations during the Antarctic summers of 1956/57, 76/77, 79/80.
1962 - Oceanographic experiments with Pacific Northwest universities in the Chukchi Sea, 5-25 July, Bering Sea, 6-19 September, and East Siberian Sea and Arctic Ocean, 2-26 October.
7 August-18 September 1963 - Oceanographic experiments in the Chukchi, East Siberian and Laptev seas with University of Southern California.
July-October 1964 - Bering Sea Patrol and oceanographic experiments in Bering Strait and Chukchi Sea.
July 1965 - Oceanographic survey between Greenland, Iceland and Scotland, and in Kara Sea off the Soviet Union.
Mid-October 1965 - Escorted disabled Swedish MV Orion in the North Atlantic to the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
July-August 1967 - Current and hydrographic survey in Bering Strait.
September-November 1967 - Icebound 450 miles NNW of Point Barrow, AK. Freed by USCGC Staten Island and Canadian icebreaker John A MacDonald.
9 June-15 July 1969 - Oceanographic survey in Chukchi and Bering seas.
8 -22 September 1969 - With Canadian icebreaker MacDonald, escorted tanker Manhattan from Resolute, AK to Prudhoe Bay as part of a transit of Northwest Passage. This was the first passage by a commercial ship.
20 January-9 April 1970 - Western Arctic patrol and oceanographic cruise.
23 June-28 September 1970 - Arctic Operations, including laying cables, oceanographic studies, and re-supplying the DEW (Distance Early Warning) Line. On the 13 July, rescued two from ditched helicopter in Norton Sound near the Yukon.
June-July 1973 - Conducted oceanographic research in Alaskan waters.
1973-75 - Major modernization at the Coast Guard Yard, Curtis Bay, MD.
1975-81 - Took part in Arctic cruises in Summer 75, July-December 1978, September-December 1981.
1978-89 - Stationed at Wilmington, NC and used for icebreaking, including the Great Lakes.
16 February 1984 - Medevaced a woman from 33-ft yacht 200 miles west of Bermuda.
28 April 1984 - Assisted a USN Landing Craft, Mechanised (LCM) to extinguish a fire in the Caribbean.
4 November 1984 - Seized Alexi I and 20 tons of marijuana, 240 miles SW of Jamaica.
2 July-21 July 1986 - Assisted Danish and Greenland governments to reestablish a musk-ox herd in NW Greenland.
Summer 1988 - Took part in Arctic East Summer.
Fate: Decommissioned 20 January 1989, assigned to James River Reserve Fleet, later sold for scrap.
Link: USCG Historian's site
Operation Deep Freeze, 14 December 1956 |
In drydock, 1980. Shows distinctive hull shape and ice-breaking bow |
A general note on the sources.