USCGC ''Cape Fox'' (WPB-95316) was a Type B of the

United States Coast Guard The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is the maritime security, search and rescue, and Admiralty law, law enforcement military branch, service branch of the armed forces of the United States. It is one of the country's eight Uniformed services ...

. Built at the

Coast Guard Yard The United States Coast Guard Yard or just Coast Guard Yard is a United States Coast Guard operated shipyard located on Curtis Bay in northern Anne Arundel County, Maryland, just south of the Baltimore city limits. It is the Department of Homela ...

Curtis Bay, Baltimore Curtis Bay is a residential / commercial / industrial neighborhood in the southern portion of the City of Baltimore, Maryland, United States. The neighborhood is on steep sloping heights, about four city blocks wide (west to east) and fifteen ...

the vessel was commissioned on 22 August 1955.

Service history

The ship was stationed at

New London, Connecticut New London is a seaport city and a port of entry on the northeast coast of the United States, located at the outlet of the Thames River (Connecticut), Thames River in New London County, Connecticut, which empties into Long Island Sound. The cit ...

, until transferred to

Riviera Beach, Florida Riviera Beach is a city in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States, which was incorporated on September 29, 1922. Due to the location of its eastern boundary, it is also the easternmost municipality in the Miami metropolitan area. In the 2020 ...

, in 1964. After a major refit in 1980–82, she replaced the Cape York in late 1981 after the Cuban Boatlift in

Key West, Florida Key West is an island in the Straits of Florida, at the southern end of the U.S. state of Florida. Together with all or parts of the separate islands of Sigsbee Park, Dredgers Key, Fleming Key, Sunset Key, and the northern part of Stock Islan ...

, apart from the period between December 1983 to February 1984, when she conducted surveillance operations from

St. George's, Grenada St. George's ( Grenadian Creole French: ''Sen Jòj'') is the capital and largest city of Grenada. The city is surrounded by a hillside of an old volcano crater and is located on a horseshoe-shaped harbour. St. George's is a popular Caribbean ...

. The principal duties of ''Cape Fox'' were

search and rescue Search and rescue (SAR) is the search for and provision of aid to people who are in distress or imminent danger. The general field of search and rescue includes many specialty sub-fields, typically determined by the type of terrain the search ...

and law enforcement operations; she was credited with numerous seizures of shipments of illegal drugs. The ship was decommissioned on 30 June 1989, and transferred to

The Bahamas The Bahamas, officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic and island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the Atlantic Ocean. It contains 97 per cent of the archipelago's land area and 88 per cent of ...

, where she served in the

Royal Bahamas Defence Force The Royal Bahamas Defence Force (RBDF) is the military of the Bahamas. Since the Bahamas does not have an army or an air force, its navy composes the entirety of its armed forces. Under The Defence Act, the Royal Bahamas Defence Force has been m ...

under the name HMBS ''San Salvador II'' (P10) until 1999.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cape Fox 1955 ships Ships built by the United States Coast Guard Yard

Fox Foxes are small-to-medium-sized omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull; upright, triangular ears; a pointed, slightly upturned snout; and a long, bushy tail ("brush"). Twelve species ...

Cape-class cutters of the Royal Bahamas Defence Force