Construction begins on CG fast response cutters - Navy News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Navy Times

Construction begins on CG fast response cutters

Work has finally begun on the Coast Guard’s latest Deepwater addition: the fast response cutter.

Bollinger Shipyards of Lockport, La., began construction in late November on Sentinel, the first in a class of 58 cutters. The Coast Guard awarded a contract option for about $141 million to Bollinger Shipyards on Tuesday to begin production on three additional fast response cutters. The second cutter will be called Guardian, but the third and fourth hulls have not been named, said Laura Williams, a spokeswoman for the acquisitions directorate at Coast Guard headquarters in Washington.

The design for the 154-foot patrol boats successfully cleared a critical design review in mid-November and the Homeland Security Department’s Acquisition Review Board earlier this month.

In September 2008, the Coast Guard awarded Bollinger an $88 million contract for the lead Sentinel. The initial patrol boat, which will be homeported in Miami, is expected to be delivered to the Coast Guard in the third quarter of fiscal 2011.

The Sentinel-class contract is worth up to $1.5 billion if all options for 34 cutters are exercised. The 154-foot patrol boats will replace the aging 110-foot Island-class patrol boats. The longer boats allow for larger crews — 23 people versus 16 — which the Coast Guard felt were needed, said Lt. Cmdr. Herb Eggert, the sponsor’s representative. The larger cutters also handle better in 8-foot seas and have centralized berthing, which reduces crew fatigue in stormy weather, he said. The cutter will be outfitted with communications and computer equipment that will allow the crew to communicate with the cutter’s rigid-hull inflatable boat team beyond the horizon — another advantage over the Island class.

The other capabilities will remain the same — the fast response cutters will have a flank speed of 28 knots and be able to perform independently for a minimum of five days at sea. The cutters will be used in drug and migrant interdiction, fisheries enforcement, search and rescue, and port security.