News Release

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EDITOR'S NOTE: Media interested in attending the commissioning ceremony are asked to RSVP no later than Thursday with Public Affairs at 305-415-6683. Attendees must bring valid government issued identification to be granted port access. Interviews available following commissioning ceremony.

WHO:  Adm. Robert Papp, U.S. Coast Guard commandant, Cmdr. Christian Lee, commanding officer of the Coast Guard Cutter Richard Etheridge along with other Coast Guard senior officers and distinguished federal, state and local officials. 

WHAT:  The Coast Guard Cutter Richard Etheridge, the Coast Guard's second Sentinel Class patrol boat, is scheduled to be commissioned at Port Everglades, Fla., Friday.

The Sentinel Class Fast Response Cutters are designed to conduct maritime drug interdiction, alien migrant interdiction, search and rescue, national defense, homeland security, living marine resources and other Coast Guard missions.  This class of patrol boat is capable of deploying independently to execute Coast Guard missions and prevent potential threats from approaching our shores and offers vastly improved capabilities over the aging 110-foot Island class patrol boats it replaces. The Fast Response Cutter is part of the Coast Guard's layered approach to maritime security that includes the National Security Cutter and the Offshore Patrol Cutter. 

The Etheridge is 154 feet long, has a beam of 25 feet and a maximum sustained speed of more than 28 knots.  The cutter is armed with a stabilized 25mm machine-gun mount and four, crew-served .50-caliber machine guns. The cutter is named after Richard Etheridge, the first African-American to command a life-saving station.  Etheridge led the Pea Island Lifesaving Station crew of six in a daring rescue operation that saved the entire crew of the schooner E.S. Newman, which had become grounded in a treacherous storm in 1896.

WHEN:  Friday at 11:00 a.m.

WHERE:  Port Everglades, 2025 Eller Drive, Fort Lauderdale, FL 33316 - Terminal 25, parking for live trucks will be at the North end of Terminal 25 and all others will be in the mid-port parking garage, be sure to get a parking voucher.

For additional background information on the namesake of the cutter, Richard Etheridge, please visit http://coastguard.dodlive.mil/2010/10/coast-guard-heroes-richard-etheridge/

To find out more about the Coast Guard's Fast Response Cutter program, visit: http://www.uscg.mil/acquisition/sentinel/default.asp