USCGC ''Rollin Fritch'' is the

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

's 19th , and the first to be homeported outside of the

Caribbean The Caribbean ( , ; ; ; ) is a region in the middle of the Americas centered around the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, mostly overlapping with the West Indies. Bordered by North America to the north, Central America ...

. She is based at the Coast Guard Training Center in

Cape May, New Jersey Cape May (sometimes Cape May City) is a City (New Jersey), city and seaside resort located at the southern tip of Cape May Peninsula in Cape May County, New Jersey, Cape May County in the U.S. state of New Jersey. Located on the Atlantic Ocean ...

. Like her sister ships she was built in the

Bollinger Shipyards Bollinger Shipyards is an American constructor of ships, workboats and patrol vessels. Its thirteen shipyards and forty drydocks are located in Louisiana and Texas. Its drydocks range in capacity from vessels of 100 tons displacement to 22,000 t ...

, in

Lockport, Louisiana Lockport is a town on Bayou Lafourche in Lafourche Parish, Louisiana, Lafourche Parish, Louisiana, United States. The population was 2,490 in 2020. It is part of the Houma, Louisiana, Houma–Bayou Cane, Louisiana, Bayou Cane–Thibodaux, ...

. She was delivered for her sea trials on August 23, 2016, and commissioned on November 19, 2016.

Design

''Rollin Fritch'', like her sister Sentinel-class cutters, is designed with an endurance of five days, and . She is armed with a 25 mm autocannon, gyro-stabilized, and fired from a sensor equipped remote weapons station on the bridge, supplemented by four crew-served

M2 Browning The M2 machine gun or Browning .50-caliber machine gun (informally, "Ma Deuce") is a heavy machine gun that was designed near the end of World War I by John Browning. While similar to Browning's M1919 Browning machine gun, which was chambered ...

machine guns. Her maximum speed is in excess of . She carries a waterjet-propelled high-speed pursuit boat, deployed and retrieved via a

stern launching ramp Some modern patrol vessels are equipped with a stern launching ramp, or simply launching ramp, for deploying smaller rescue or pursuit boats without requiring the parent ship to first come to a halt. Typically the smaller craft are powered b ...

. The ramp allows the pursuit boat to be deployed and retrieved without bringing the cutter to a stop.

Operational duty

''Rollin Fritch'', like her

sister ship A sister ship is a ship of the same Ship class, class or of virtually identical design to another ship. Such vessels share a nearly identical hull and superstructure layout, similar size, and roughly comparable features and equipment. They o ...

s, is designed for

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 the interception of smugglers. Her high-speed waterjet-propelled pursuit boat, launched from her stern launching ramp, make her a potent weapon for the interception of smugglers.

Homeported in Cape May

The homeport of ''Rollin Fritch'' and her sister ship, is the Coast Guard Training Center in Cape May. According to the ''

Cape May County Herald The ''Cape May County Herald'' is a weekly newspaper in Rio Grande, New Jersey. - See also: Also identical in the 1990 U.S. Census: - Rio Grande CDP is on page25an26 History It has been serving residents and visitors of Cape May County, ...

'' local citizens welcome the Coast Guard presence, and its contribution to the local economy.

Namesake

In 2010, Charles "Skip" W. Bowen, who was then the United States Coast Guard's most senior

non-commissioned officer A non-commissioned officer (NCO) is an enlisted rank, enlisted leader, petty officer, or in some cases warrant officer, who does not hold a Commission (document), commission. Non-commissioned officers usually earn their position of authority b ...

, proposed that all 58 cutters in the Sentinel class should be named after enlisted sailors in the Coast Guard, or one of its precursor services, who were recognized for their heroism. In 2014 the Coast Guard announced that Rollin A. Fritch, a Coast Guard seaman who earned a posthumous

Silver Star The Silver Star Medal (SSM) is the United States Armed Forces' third-highest military decoration for valor in combat. The Silver Star Medal is awarded primarily to members of the United States Armed Forces for gallantry in action against a ...

for his service on the transport during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, would be the namesake of the 19th cutter. Fritch served as a gunner who was seen bravely firing his anti-aircraft gun at a

kamikaze , officially , were a part of the Japanese Special Attack Units of military aviators who flew suicide attacks for the Empire of Japan against Allied naval vessels in the closing stages of the Pacific campaign of World War II, intending to d ...

aircraft right up until it struck the bridge where his gun was sited.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rollin Fritch (WPC-1119) Sentinel-class cutters Ships of the United States Coast Guard 2016 ships Ships built in Lockport, Louisiana