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Coast Guard whistleblower given award

The chairman of the House Coast Guard subcommittee presented a “public service award” Monday to a former Lockheed Martin employee whose YouTube videos alleged there was shoddy equipment aboard the Coast Guard’s eight modified patrol boats.

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Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., gave the IEE Carl Barus Award, a recognition by the Society of Social Implications of Technology, to the ex-contractor Michael De Kort, for his “commitment to excellence,” Cummings’ office announced.

“Had everyone involved in the Deepwater program approached the program with the same commitment Mr. De Kort brought, we would not have had the failures in the program that we have experienced,” Cummings said in a statement.

In 2006, De Kort posted an online video that talked about the “alarming incompetence” of the Coast Guard’s program to lengthen eight 110-foot patrol cutters with new boat ramps and modern electronics systems. De Kort alleged that the boats’ surveillance cameras had blind spots; that their Forward-Looking Infrared systems weren’t adequate for Coast Guard patrols; and that their communications gear wasn’t compatible with the U.S. secure TEMPEST networks — and that Lockheed and the Coast Guard knew about it and did nothing.

A 2006 report by the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general criticized the Coast Guard’s management of the 123-foot upgrades, especially the boats’ communications and electronics systems.

The Coast Guard and its contractors initially disputed De Kort’s allegations, but since then, that specific controversy became moot — other problems with the upgraded cutters, including cracked superstructures and buckled hulls, forced the Coast Guard to decommission them in 2007. In December, the Coast Guard’s acquisition directorate asked the lead Deepwater contractor, Integrated Coast Guard Systems, to pay $96.1 million as compensation for the lost boats, a dispute that is likely to continue.