Role
Among the responsibilities that may be entrusted to a coast guard service are:
- search and rescue,
- enforcement of maritime law,
- safety of vessels,
- maintenance of seamarks and
- border control
During wartime, some coast guard organizations might have responsibilities in harbor defense, port security, naval counter-intelligence and coastal patrols.
The coast guard may, varying by jurisdiction, be part of the country's military, a law enforcement agency, or a search and rescue body. For example, the U.S. Coast Guard is a military branch with a law enforcement capacity, whereas the United Kingdom's Her Majesty's Coastguard is a civilian organisation whose only role is search and rescue. Most coast guards operate ships and aircraft including helicopters and seaplanes that are either owned or leased by the agency in order to fulfill their respective roles.
Some coast guards, such as the Irish Coast Guard have only a very limited law enforcement role, usually in enforcing maritime safety law, such as by inspecting ships docked in their jurisdiction. In cases where the coast guard is primarily concerned with coordinating rather than executing rescue operations, lifeboats are often provided by civilian voluntary organizations, such as the Royal National Lifeboat Institution in the United Kingdom, whilst aircraft may be provided by the countries' armed forces, such as Sea Kings operated by the RAF and Royal Navy in addition to any of the coast guard's own assets.
Read more about this topic: Coast Guard
Famous quotes containing the word role:
“The role of the intelligence—that part of us which affirms and denies and formulates opinions—is merely to submit.”
—Simone Weil (1909–1943)
“The trouble is that the expression ‘material thing’ is functioning already, from the very beginning, simply as a foil for ‘sense-datum’; it is not here given, and is never given, any other role to play, and apart from this consideration it would surely never have occurred to anybody to try to represent as some single kind of things the things which the ordinary man says that he ‘perceives.’”
—J.L. (John Langshaw)
“You are pitiful isolated individuals; you are bankrupts; your role is played out. Go where you belong from now on—into the dustbin of history!”
—Leon Trotsky (1879–1940)