Nautical Research Journal
there until 1975. The cutter’s duties included offshore oilrig inspections, fi sheries and marine pollution patrols, and search and rescue. During Reliance IV’s long career, it has been homeported in Yorktown, Virginia; Port Canaveral, Florida; and New Castle, New Hampshire. Presently based out of Kittery, Maine, at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard, Reliance patrols Atlantic waters from the eastern coast of Canada to the northern tip of South America. Its many duties include the enforcement of laws and treaties, fi sheries patrols, migrant interdiction, drug interdiction, safety inspections, and search and rescue.
In addition to its distinguished career, Reliance IV occupies a unique place in Coast Guard history. Reliance was the fi rst cutter built as part of the Service’s post-World War II fl eet revitalization. From World War II through the 1950s, the Coast Guard had re-purposed surplus Navy ships, so Reliance was the fi rst purpose-built cutter laid down and commissioned after World War II. With the exception of the Wind- Class icebreakers, Reliance marked the fi rst new Coast Guard cutter construction since the 1930s.
4. Reliance in drydock.
operations in December 1940. By 1941, the cutter was stationed at Pearl Harbor, and on December 7, Reliance III became one of the fi rst American warships to see combat action in World War II. The cutter fi red on Japanese aircraft until they withdrew. The cutter continued to perform wartime duty in the Pacifi c until 1946. That year the cutter was transferred to Cordova, Alaska, and performed law enforcement and search and rescue missions for a year. Reliance III was decommissioned in 1947 and sold out of the service in 1948.
Today’s Reliance is the fi rst of the 210-foot medium- endurance cutter fl eet and its class’s namesake cutter. In 1962, Commandant Edwin Roland presided over Reliance IV’s keel laying at the Houston, Texas-based Todd Shipyard. The cutter was stationed in Corpus Christi after its 1964 commissioning and remained
The Navy’s Offi ce of Naval Architecture and Engineering designed the Reliance-Class to perform traditional Coast Guard missions and support Navy operations in case the Cold War heated up. Thus, Reliance and its sister cutters were designed with a 3-inch deck gun and mounts for 40-millimeter cannons, and anti-submarine weapons and equipment. The Reliance-class also came equipped with state-of- the-art navigation and communications technology and controllable-pitch propellers. Moreover, Reliance was the fi rst cutter equipped with a combination diesel and gas (CODAG) powerplant that drove the cutter at speeds of up to 20 knots, so it could tow a 10,000-ton vessel or keep pace with Navy carrier fl eets.
The Reliance-class featured superior comfort and habitability for the crew with the fi rst use of air conditioning on a cutter. In addition, the famed industrial design fi rm of Loewy-Snaith, Inc. (designers of the Coast Guard Racing Stripe logo) worked with the Coast Guard Design Branch to
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