United States Coast Guard

Floor Speech

UNITED STATES COAST GUARD -- (Senate - March 31, 2008)

Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, many of my fellow Americans are very aware of the exhilaration but also the dangers and risks of commercial fishing in Alaska's Bering Sea. The pictures and the stories--and even the sounds--are brought into our living rooms every week on the Discovery Channel program ``The Deadliest Catch.'' Many have seen it.

When the Bering Sea fishing fleet finds itself in trouble, they rely on the men and women of the U.S. Coast Guard to truly make order from the chaos. These stories have not escaped Hollywood's attention. It is not only seen on ``The Deadliest Catch,'' but there was a 2006 feature film, ``The Guardian,'' starring Kevin Costner and Ashton Kutcher, which paid tribute to the Coast Guard search and rescue teams based at Air Station Kodiak in Alaska. Coast Guard Air Station Kodiak is home to aircrews and rescue swimmers who endure some of the harshest winds and seas in the world. They put their own lives on the line every day so that others may live.

The events that were depicted in ``The Guardian'' were fictional, but the events that transpired this past Easter morning in the Bering Sea were very real. I rise today to honor the men and women of the U.S. Coast Guard who participated in efforts to rescue the 47-member crew of the fishing vessel Alaska Ranger. As a direct result of these heroic efforts, 42 members of the Ranger's crew survived. There were no Coast Guard lives lost. In the words of RADM Arthur Brooks, commander of the Seventeenth Coast Guard District, it was ``one of the greatest search and rescue efforts in modern history.''

Let me kind of paint the scene for you. It was 2:52 a.m. local time on Easter Sunday, March 23, that the Alaska Ranger, a Seattle-based factory trawler, radioed the Coast Guard Communications Station Kodiak with a distress call. The vessel at that time was located 120 miles west of Dutch Harbor at the end of the Aleutian Chain. The vessel was taking on water. There were 25-knot winds and seas 6 to 8 feet high.

The Coast Guard immediately launched a rescue effort. There was a cutter, two helicopters, and a C-130. The crew of the Ranger had to abandon ship before the first Coast Guard asset arrived.

First to arrive on the scene is a Coast Guard Jayhawk Rescue Helicopter, deployed from St. Paul Island, located about 230 miles to the north of where the Alaska Ranger was at the time.

The Jayhawk carried a crew of four men. There was no backup. The Jayhawk arrives on the scene about 5:30 a.m. This is about 2 1/2 hours after the first distress call. This helps put in perspective the distances with which we are dealing. By this point in time, the Alaska Ranger has already sunk in the water. The vessel is completely gone. It has already sunk in water that is more than 6,300 feet deep.

The air crew flies in and looks upon this sea of flashing strobe lights. Keep in mind, this is 5:30 in the morning. It is still dark. They have wind and sleet and waves coming up, and they see this sea of flashing strobe lights, probably a mile end to end. They are looking down at this scene through the helicopter thinking there is a light there: Is that a liferaft? Yet another light and another light. Each light is a member of the Ranger's crew wearing a survival suit. Some are in liferafts, but others were literally in this human chain stretching almost a mile in length. Others are floating alone. The water temperature in the sea is about 32 degrees.

Rescue swimmer O'Brien Hollow is lowered into the water to triage the survivors. One by one, he positions the survivors to be hoisted into the helicopter above. The helicopter is tossing above in these very heavy winds. Hollow is tethered to the helicopter from above.

We also have then the Coast Guard cutter Munro. It has been diverted from its position 130 nautical miles south of the incident. It is racing to the scene at the speed of about 30 knots.

The Munro carries a Dolphin rescue helicopter which lifts off the Munro some 80 miles before the cutter arrives at the scene.

Rescue swimmer Abram Heller is lowered into the water and begins to gather victims to be hoisted into the basket to be lifted up into the helicopter. Heller stays in the water to make room on the Dolphin for survivors.

One has to remember, they have some 47 men in the water. They are trying to lift them into the basket and then into the helicopter, but the helicopter can only accommodate so many people. The rescue swimmer is saying: I am going to stay down here; move this group to safety.

The Jayhawk then departs the scene for the Munro, but the Jayhawk cannot land on the cutter's deck because it is too big. So the Jayhawk crew hoists the survivors down to the Munro's deck one by one. Just as they have been lifting survivors out of the sea into this helicopter that is pitching around in the air, they now have to be dropped down to the deck one at a time in the basket.

In the meantime, a fuel line is sent up from the Munro's deck to refuel the Jayhawk, and it then departs to the scene.

The Jayhawk recovers Heller, the rescue swimmer who has been down there with the survivors, and rescues more survivors. In total, the Jayhawk is responsible for saving 15 lives. The Dolphin saves five lives.

The third player in this supremely heroic effort is a Coast Guard C-130, which circled over the scene serving as an airborne coordination and communications platform.

The Coast Guard also received substantial assistance from the Ranger's sister fishing vessel, the Alaska Warrior. The Alaska Warrior also had been out on the Alaska fishing grounds. They left their fishing grounds to pick up 22 survivors from the Ranger who were in liferafts and then returned them to Dutch Harbor.

Unfortunately, four of the Ranger's crew members could not be saved. One still remains unaccounted for. The Coast Guard sent the Jayhawk and a C-130 back to the scene with fresh crews to search for the missing mariner but without success. The search for the missing crew member was suspended on Tuesday, March 25.

The Coast Guard uses the maritime phrase ``Bravo Zulu'' to recognize a job well done, and this was truly a job well done. While the Coast Guard rigorously trains its people to perform this mission, it is very rare to undertake a mission of this intensity and this complexity.

Rescue swimmers Hollow and Heller had participated in rescues before but nothing approaching this kind of a rescue. In fact, rescues of this nature are extremely rare. After very carefully examining the records dating back over 30 years, the Coast Guard could only find a couple mass rescue cases that were even remotely similar to what we experienced on Easter.

While dramatic search-and-rescue cases are no stranger to Alaska, most involve 10 victims or less. Others involve a much more orderly abandonment of a vessel. This was the case in 1980, when the cruise ship Prinsendam went down near Yakutat, AK. But large numbers of people abandoning ship directly into the water hardly ever happens. That is one more reason why this rescue effort was remarkable. But it is not the only reason.

The risks that were involved in this case were extreme. They had, again, darkness, extremely high winds, high seas, ice, freezing temperatures, extremely long distances from any supporting infrastructure, and all these conditions present unique hazards to the rescuers.

Success such as this could not occur without the commitment of a great many people. The crews of the Jayhawk, the Dolphin, and the Munro will long be remembered for their heroism.

Backing them were the watch standers at Coast Guard Communications Station Kodiak. These were the folks who answered the Alaska Ranger's mayday call. The C-130 crews, the Kodiak Air Station duty officers, and the District 17 command center controllers in Juneau also contributed. In total, something on the order of 170 Alaska-based Coast Guard men and women were involved in this effort.

ADM Thad Allen has already expressed ``Bravo Zulu'' to all the men and women involved with this effort. I am honored to take a few minutes from the Senate's day to praise these men and women of the U.S. Coast Guard on a job well done. Our Nation is always well served by these highly trained individuals who stand ``always ready.''

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