USCGC Fir (WLB-213)
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| USCGC Fir (WLB 213) | |
| Career | 100x35px |
|---|---|
| Builder: |
Manitowoc Company, Inc. Marinette, Wisconsin |
| Launched: | August 18, 2003 |
| Commissioned: | 8 November 2003 |
| Homeport: | Astoria, Oregon |
| Motto: | "No Bar Too Rough, Too Tough, Too Far" |
| Fate: | Active in service as of 2008 |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | Juniper class cutters |
| Type: | Buoy tender |
| Displacement: | 2,000 tons (full load) |
| Length: | 225 ft (69 m) |
| Beam: | 46 ft (14 m) |
| Draft: | 13 ft (4.0 m) |
| Speed: | 17.5 knots |
| Boats and landing craft carried: | 1 UTL & 1 RHI |
| Complement: | 7 Officers, 46 Enlisted |
USCGC Fir (WLB-213) is a Juniper-class United States Coast Guard Cutter.
Overview
Fir is the multi-mission heavy lift platform for the U. S. Coast Guard Thirteenth District. Fir was launched on August 18, 2003, and commissioned on November 8, 2003.
Fir's homeport is Astoria, Oregon.
Missions
Fir, a seagoing buoy tender, is responsible for 150 aids to navigation for an area of responsibility that stretches from the Oregon-California Border to the Canadian border and includes the dangerous river bars of the Pacific Northwest. Fir also conducts extensive law enforcement operations, and is always ready to perform port waterways and coastal security, search and rescue, and marine environmental response operations.[1][2]
Technology & Equipment
Fir is equipped with a dynamic positioning system that utilizes a bow thruster, stern truster and the ship's controllable pitch propellor to hold the ship's position and heading at the push of a button. The dynamic positioning system relies on inputs from the Differential Global Positioning System. In dynamic positioning mode the ship can be driven with a joystick from several locations on the bridge, and from a mobile ship control console.[1][2]
The ship recently converted all of its lighted aids to navigation from incandescent to LED lights. Fir is the first unit in the Coast Guard to do so.[3]
As a heavy lift platform Fir has a 20-ton hydraulic crane, a chain in-haul system and 4 heavy cross-deck winches.[2]
Fir carries two small boats; a cutter boat large (CB-L), specifically designed for law enforcement, and a CG Standard Utility Boat (UTL).[2]
Fir is armed with several .50cal Machine Guns, M240 light machine guns, and small arms for law enforcement and defense operations. In accordance with United States and international law,Fir is a United States warship.
History
Fir is named after one of the original lighthouse tenders built for the Lighthouse Service to resupply lighthouses and lightships, and to service buoys. The original Cutter Fir was built by the Moore Drydock Company in Oakland, California in 1939. After serving as a truly multi-mission platform, adapting to the changing missions of the Coast Guard for over 50 years, Fir was decommissioned in 1991.[4][1][2]
It is distinct from a predecessor ship of the same name, Template:USCGC.
References
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