USCGC ''Elm'' (WLB-204) is a U.S. Coast Guard ''Juniper''-class seagoing buoy tender home-ported in

Astoria, Oregon Astoria is a Port, port city in and the county seat of Clatsop County, Oregon, United States. Founded in 1811, Astoria is the oldest city in the state and was the first permanent American settlement west of the Rocky Mountains. The county is the ...

. She is responsible for maintaining aids to navigation on the coasts of

Oregon Oregon ( , ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is a part of the Western U.S., with the Columbia River delineating much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while t ...

and

Washington Washington most commonly refers to: * George Washington (1732–1799), the first president of the United States * Washington (state), a state in the Pacific Northwest of the United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A ...

, including the

Columbia River The Columbia River (Upper Chinook language, Upper Chinook: ' or '; Sahaptin language, Sahaptin: ''Nch’i-Wàna'' or ''Nchi wana''; Sinixt dialect'' '') is the largest river in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. The river headwater ...

Construction

''Elm'' was built by the

Marinette Marine Corporation Fincantieri Marinette Marine (FMM) is an American shipbuilding firm in Marinette, Wisconsin. Marinette Marine was a subsidiary of Manitowoc Marine Group of Wisconsin from 2000 to 2009, when it was sold to Fincantieri Marine Group. History M ...

on the

Menominee River The Menominee River is a river in northwestern Michigan and northeastern Wisconsin in the United States. It is approximately long,U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed Dec ...

Wisconsin Wisconsin ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest of the United States. It borders Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michig ...

. ''Elm'' was launched on January 24, 1998. She was the fourth of the fourteen ''Juniper''-class ships launched. Her original cost was approximately $26 million. Her hull is constructed of welded steel plates. She is long and has a beam of . She is capable of maintaining a sustained speed of 15 knots. The ship has thirteen diesel fuel tanks capable of holding 74,498 gallons. ''Elm'' has an unrefueled range of 6,000 miles at 12 knots. USCGC Elm icebreaking

''Elm'' has a single variable-pitch propeller that is powered by two

Caterpillar Caterpillars ( ) are the larval stage of members of the order Lepidoptera (the insect order comprising butterflies and moths). As with most common names, the application of the word is arbitrary, since the larvae of sawflies (suborder ...

3608 Diesel engines, each with an indicated 3,100 shp. There are two electric maneuvering thrusters, the bow thruster producing 460 hp and the stern thruster producing 550 hp. The thrusters act as part of a

dynamic positioning system Dynamic positioning (DP) is a computer-controlled system to automatically maintain a vessel's position and heading by using its own propellers and thrusters. Position reference sensors, combined with wind sensors, motion sensors and gyrocompass ...

that is capable of maintaining the ship within five meters of a fixed position on the sea in winds up to 30 knots and seas up to . This allows the crew to work on buoys in difficult weather conditions. The ship's crane extends to and can lift onto her buoy deck, which is 2,875 square feet in area. ''Elm'' is capable of light icebreaking. She can sail through ice thick at three knots. ''Elm'' is armed with two 50-caliber machine guns and a variety of small arms for boarding operations. ''Elm'' and all but one of the ''Juniper''-class buoy tenders are named after trees. She is the third Coast Guard ship of this name. The first ''

Elm Elms are deciduous and semi-deciduous trees comprising the genus ''Ulmus'' in the family Ulmaceae. They are distributed over most of the Northern Hemisphere, inhabiting the temperate and tropical- montane regions of North America and Eurasia, ...

'' was a derrick barge launched in 1919 to maintain aids to navigation in the

Hudson River The Hudson River, historically the North River, is a river that flows from north to south largely through eastern New York (state), New York state. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains at Henderson Lake (New York), Henderson Lake in the ...

. The second USCGC ''Elm'' (WAGL-260/WLI-72260) was a buoy tender launched in 1938.

Operational history

After launch and sea trials, ''Elm'' sailed down the

Great Lakes The Great Lakes, also called the Great Lakes of North America, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes spanning the Canada–United States border. The five lakes are Lake Superior, Superior, Lake Michigan, Michigan, Lake Huron, H ...

and

Saint Lawrence Seaway The St. Lawrence Seaway () is a system of rivers, locks, canals and channels in Eastern Canada and Northern United States that permits oceangoing vessels to travel from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes of North America, as far inland ...

to reach her new homeport of

Atlantic Beach, North Carolina Atlantic Beach is a town in Carteret County, North Carolina, United States. It is one of the five communities located on Bogue Banks. The population was 1,364 at the 2020 census. History The idea of Atlantic Beach was first envisioned in the ...

. She was based at Coast Guard Station Fort Macon. Her primary mission was to maintain 250 buoys between Shark River Inlet, New Jersey and the border between North and South Carolina, including

Chesapeake Bay The Chesapeake Bay ( ) is the largest estuary in the United States. The bay is located in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region and is primarily separated from the Atlantic Ocean by the Delmarva Peninsula, including parts of the Ea ...

. She supported other Coast Guard missions as well, including search and rescue, law enforcement, oil spill response, and light icebreaking. In her search and rescue role, she extinguished a fire aboard the scallop-fishing vessel ''Captain O. J. Riggs'' in 2009. ''Elm'' was dispatched to search for survivors of the replica HMS ''Bounty'' which was sunk by

Hurricane Sandy Hurricane Sandy (unofficially referred to as Superstorm Sandy) was an extremely large and devastating tropical cyclone which ravaged the Caribbean and the coastal Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States in late ...

in 2012. In her law enforcement role, Elm participated in repatriating Cubans attempting to reach the United States in 2007. ''Elm'' served as an icebreaker in the Hudson River and Chesapeake Bay. USCGC Elm buoy recovery

The

Deepwater Horizon ''Deepwater Horizon'' was an ultra-deepwater, Dynamic positioning, dynamically positioned, Semi-submersible platform, semi-submersible offshore drilling Oil platform, rig owned by Transocean and operated by the BP company. On 20 April 2010, ...

drilling platform exploded in the

Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico () is an oceanic basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, mostly surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north, and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United States; on the southw ...

in April 2010. In May ''Elm'' was deployed to assist in the oil spill response, using her Spilled Oil Recovery System. She succeeded in skimming more than 500,000 gallons of oil during her six-month deployment, more than any other Coast Guard cutter. ''Elm'' was one of the ships that participated in

Fleet Week Fleet Week is a United States Navy, United States Marine Corps, and United States Coast Guard tradition in which active military ships recently deployed in overseas operations dock in a variety of major cities for one week. Once the ships dock, ...

celebrations at

Port Everglades Port Everglades is a seaport in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, located in Broward County. Port Everglades is one of South Florida's foremost economic engines, as it is the gateway for both international trade and cruise vacations. In 2022, Port Eve ...

in 2006. In January 2018 ''Elm'' went into drydock 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 ...

Baltimore Baltimore is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland. With a population of 585,708 at the 2020 census and estimated at 568,271 in 2024, it is the 30th-most populous U.S. city. The Baltimore metropolitan area is the 20th-large ...

for a mid-life major overhaul. She left the yard on June 13, 2019. On July 15, 2019 ''Elm'' reached her new homeport, Astoria, Oregon, replacing ''

Fir Firs are evergreen coniferous trees belonging to the genus ''Abies'' () in the family Pinaceae. There are approximately 48–65 extant species, found on mountains throughout much of North and Central America, Eurasia, and North Africa. The genu ...

,'' which sailed for Baltimore for her own mid-life overhaul in June 2018. ''Fir's'' crew, already familiar with the operating area, took over ''Elm''. In her new role, ''Elm'' is responsible for maintaining 131 floating buoys on the coasts of Oregon and Washington from the California border north to the

Strait of Juan de Fuca The Strait of Juan de Fuca (officially named Juan de Fuca Strait in Canada) is a body of water about long that is the Salish Sea's main outlet to the Pacific Ocean. The Canada–United States border, international boundary between Canada and the ...

, and in the Columbia River east to

Longview, Washington Longview is a city in Cowlitz County, Washington, Cowlitz County, Washington (state), Washington, United States. It is the principal city of the Longview, Washington Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses all of Cowlitz County. Longvie ...

. She is stationed at Coast Guard Base Tongue Point. In the spring of 2022, ''Elm'' also supported aids to navigation in Northern California, covering for USCGC ''Alder'' which sailed to the Coast Guard Yard for its own mid-life overhaul. ''Elm'' has cooperated with

NOAA The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA ) is an American scientific and regulatory agency charged with forecasting weather, monitoring oceanic and atmospheric conditions, charting the seas, conducting deep-sea exploratio ...

to maintain weather buoys on several occasions in the Atlantic, Caribbean, and Pacific.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Elm (WLB-204) Ships of the United States Coast Guard Juniper-class seagoing buoy tenders Ships built by Marinette Marine 1998 ships