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National security cutter Bertholf joins fleet

The Coast Guard commissioned the first-in-class national security cutter Bertholf on Monday in Alameda, Calif.

The Bertholf is the first of eight 418-foot, 4,000-ton national security cutters in the new Legend class, “designed to be the flagship of the Coast Guard fleet,” according to the Coast Guard.

Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., chairman of the House subcommittee on Coast Guard and maritime transportation was the keynote speaker. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Thad Allen and Bertholf commanding officer Capt. Patrick Stadt also spoke at the ceremony.

“Bertholf will improve operational readiness and enable the Coast Guard to fulfill its multi-mission roles more effectively through better sea keeping, higher sustained transit speeds, greater endurance and range, and a greater ability to launch and recover improved small boats, helicopters, and eventually unmanned aerial vehicles — all key attributes in enabling the Coast Guard to implement increased security responsibilities,” according to a Coast Guard statement.

The Bertholf’s trip from the Northrop Grumman shipyard in Pascagoula, Miss., last month took it up and down the East Coast, then through the Panama Canal and north to San Francisco Bay. On July 14 the Bertholf met up with the cutter Boutwell, one of the 378-foot Hamilton-class ships it’s replacing, to transfer personnel.

Its first sister ship, the national security cutter Waesche, was christened July 26 at the shipyard in Pascagoula.