U.S. Coast Guard Service
Coos Bay was stationed at Portland, Maine, throughout her Coast Guard career. Her primary duty was to serve on ocean stations in the Atlantic Ocean to gather meteorological data. While on duty in one of these stations, she was required to patrol a 210-square-mile (544-square-kilometer) area for three weeks at a time, leaving the area only when physically relieved by another Coast Guard cutter or in the case of a dire emergency. While on station, she acted as an aircraft check point at the point of no return, a relay point for messages from ships and aircraft, as a source of the latest weather information for passing aircraft, as a floating oceanographic laboratory, and as a search-and-rescue ship for downed aircraft and vessels in distress, and engaged in law enforcement operations.
Coos Bay rescued the 10-man crew of a downed U.S. Navy patrol aircraft midway between Bermuda and the Azores on 27 February 1953. On 11 March 1953 she assisted the commercial tanker Angy.
On 26 January 1955, Coos Bay rescued six crewmen of a downed United States Air Force transport aircraft about 1,000 nautical miles (1,900 km) east of Bermuda.
In December 1960 the Coos Bay rescued four inexperienced seamen aboard the R/V Grace (operated by the Lamont Geological Observatory) about 104 nautical miles (193 km) southwest of Bermuda. The Grace was towed back to Bermuda in heavy seas.
On 19 February 1964, Coos Bay rescued survivors from the British merchant ship Ambassador in the North Atlantic.
Coos Bay was reclassified as a high endurance cutter and redesignated WHEC-376 on 1 May 1966.
Read more about this topic: USCGC Coos Bay (WAVP-376)
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