The Navy does the flyin’, the Coast Guard does the shootin’
February 17th, 2010 | Aviation Coast Guard Maritime operations | Posted by Phil Ewing
A Navy helicopter and a Coast Guard "fire team" will collaborate to help the Freedom stop smugglers, as in this 1999 Coast Guard encounter // Coast Guard
ABOARD THE LITTORAL COMBAT SHIP FREEDOM — Remember a few weeks ago when we wondered how this ship would use its new airborne-use-of-force capability to help stop drug runners in the Caribbean? The answer is pretty simple: The Freedom’s helicopter will put Coast Guard shooters where they need to be to stop “non-compliant vessels,” as goes the law enforcement phrase, and Coast Guard fingers will pull the triggers.
Lt. Cmdr. Roy Zaletski, Freedom’s air boss — he’s a member of its helo detachment — said when the ship needs to stop a fast-moving suspected smuggler, it will deploy its MH-60S Seahawk carrying some of the ship’s embarked Coast Guardsmen. The “fire team,” as Zaletski called it, will use the standard HITRON procedures: They’ll fire warning shots with the Seahawk’s M240 machine gun to get a speedboat to stop, and if it doesn’t, a Coast Guard sniper will put a .50 caliber round in one of the boat’s engines, forcing it to slow down.
Zaletski’s helicopter also can carry AGM-114 Hellfire missiles for use on surface targets, but he said he didn’t envision needing to use them against small, drug-carrying speedboats.
“That might get a little extreme,” he said.
Comments
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mark scease Says:
February 17th, 2010 at 9:47 pmA sad comment at that.