U.S. Coast Guard prepares to plunge into Deepwater.

The U.S. Coast Guard is laying plans to get off the mark quickly with its Integrated Deepwater System Program, an ambitious, long-term effort to modernize the service's decades-old fleets of ocean-going ships, helicopters and aircraft.

The Coast Guard was poised in June to award the first in a series of five-year contracts worth as much as $15 billion over the next 20 to 30 years.

The contract calls for the winner, during that period of time, to replace or rebuild the service's forces that operate as far as 50 miles or more offshore, patrolling for terrorists, drug traffickers, illegal immigrants, commercial fishing violations or mariners in distress. Included are approximately 90 cutters and patrol boats, 70 fixed-wing aircraft, 130 helicopters, their communications equipment, sensors and logistical infrastructure.

The service planned to begin immediately, retiring obsolete platforms, renovating others and building entirely new generations of ships and aircraft, officials said. "At the heart and soul of the Deepwater program is change," Rear Adm. Patrick M. Stillman, the Coast Guard's program executive officer, told a recent NDIA-sponsored conference in Baltimore. "This is not old wine in new bottles."

Although the Coast Guard in early June had not announced the winner of the competition, the clear frontrunner was Integrated Coast Guard Systems. ICGS is a joint venture including Lockheed Martin Naval Electronics & Surveillance Systems-Surface Systems, of Moorestown, N.J.; Northrop Grumman Ship Systems Ingalls Operation, of Pascagoula, Miss., and approximately 100 other U.S. and international corporations.

In March, two other teams--led by the Boeing Company, of Chicago, and the Science Applications International Corporation, of San Diego, were notified that they were out of the running, and ICGS was asked to provide additional details of its proposals.

At press time, the ICGS team was proceeding cautiously. "It looks good, but we're nor taking anything for granted," said Jay Dragone, vice president of Coast Guard and international programs at Lockheed Martin.

Speaking before award of the contract, Dragone was reluctant to be specific about the team's plans. He did say, however, that if ICGS does win, "we're going to come out of the starting blocks very aggressively."

The Coast Guard has $320 million still available for Deepwater projects in fiscal year 2002, which ends on September 30, Dragone noted. After that, the contract calls for expenditures up to $500 million per year for five years. If the Coast Guard is satisfied by the contractor's performance, the agreement is renewable every five years.

The key to the project is modernizing the service's fleet of cutters, Dragone indicated. All Coast Guard vessels greater than 65 feet in length are called cutters. They range in size from 65-foot small harbor tugs to 399-foot polar-class icebreakers.

Relatively small, fast and lightly armed, compared to Navy ships, Coast Guard cutters have been used to enforce U.S. maritime law ever since the service's founding in 1790. Often considered the nation's fifth military service, the Coast Guard is now part of the U.S. Transportation Department. It frequently cooperates with the Navy to help protect U.S. ships and personnel in foreign waters, such as the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Sea.

In recent decades, however, the service's fleets of ships and aircraft have aged, the service's commandant, Adm. James M. Loy told a recent Senate budget hearing. The average cutter is 28 years old. Three of them were commissioned during World War II.

Many of the cutters are technologically obsolete, he said. For example, the USCG Acushnet, which was commissioned in 1944, still uses an engine-order telegraph for the bridge crew to signal the engine-room crew to change speeds.

Chasing Drug Smugglers

Slow-moving by modern standards, the cutters can't outrun the so-called "go-fast" speedboats used by drug smugglers in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Oceans, Loy said.

According to Coast Guard figures, approximately 80 percent of illegal narcotics that enter the United States via maritime routes are transported on go-fast vessels, which are typically 30 to 40 feet in length and capable of carrying up to three tons of cocaine at speeds in excess of 50 knots. Loy quoted the commander of one of his services newest cutters:

"I can't tell you how disappointing it is to pursue high-speed, drug-laden vessels through a moonless night, to close them within 3,000 yards, to be so close as to hear the wail of their engine as they crash over the wave tops--and then to hear them turn away, accelerate and disappear over the horizon."

To provide ships that can catch the go-fast boats, the ICGS team has proposed a number of hull forms. One team member--Bollinger Shipyards Inc., of Lockport, La.--has formed a joint venture with Incat Tasmania, of Hobart, Australia, to build high-speed, twin-hulled catamarans for the U.S. military services, including the Coast Guard.

One such catamaran, the 313-foot Joint Venture high-Speed Vessel, currently is undergoing tests by the U.S. services for use in relatively shallow coastal water.

Powered by four sets of marine diesel engines, gas turbines and water jets capable of throwing out 18 tons of water per second, the Joint Venture reaches speeds of 48 knots, according to Incat Project Manager Nick Wells. The Joint Venture has been equipped with a helicopter flight deck and a stern boat-launching system.

A similar ship, made by a second Australian firm, Austal Ships Pty., is being used to move Okinawa-based Marines around islands of the Western Pacific.

Another team member, Northrop Grummans Ingalls Operation, is designing a "littoral combat ship," which it hopes to sell both the Navy and the Coast Guard. The two services have agreed to cooperate on development of the LCS.

Because of the varying sizes and missions of Coast Guard ships, a variety of designs is likely, officials said. In any case, the first new ships should begin entering service within the next four years, according to Dragone.

Meanwhile, the ICGS team plans to begin retiring the oldest vessels, those of World War II vintage, the 378-foot high-endurance cutters, and the 210-foot medium-endurance cutters, which are reaching the end of their planned service lives, Dragone said. The 210 footers--which joined the Coast Guard inventory in the 1960s--are scheduled to begin retiring in 2007, followed a year later by the 378 footers, which have a similar vintage.

The older ships are personnel-intensive, according to Stillman. The 378-foot ships, for example, have 180 crewmembers apiece, and the 210 footers have 74. The catamarans, on the other hand, have crews of 31.

The Coast Guard doesn't plan to retire all of its older ships, Stillman explained. Its 270-foot medium-endurance cutters, built between 1983 and 1991, will get a service-life extension program, he noted.

The Coast Guard's aircraft fleet also is getting a major upgrade. The service's primary long-range surveillance and transport aircraft, the HC-130H Hercules--which dates back as much as three decades--is receiving a renovation of its sensor system.

Updating Aircraft

Included is a new forward-looking, infrared, electro-optical, low-light television, turret-mounted camera system. This system provides a 360-degree field-of-view and high-resolution software magnification, allowing use at standoff ranges.

Later this year, the Coast Guard is scheduled to receive the first of six HC-130J aircraft from the Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company, of Marietta, Ga. The latest version of the C-130 line of transports, the "J" can fly 21 percent faster, cruise 40 percent higher and climb 50 percent faster, according to company spokesman Peter Simmons.

Half of the Coast Guard's HU-25 Guardians, U.S.-built versions of the French-designed Dassault-Brequet Falcon 20 light-transport jet, are being retired. Older HU-25s, which the Guard uses for medium-range surveillance missions, entered service nearly 20 years ago, and are becoming too expensive to maintain, Stiliman said. The service is using the money saved by retiring the oldest Guardians to outfit the survivors with sensors similar to those going into the HC-130Hs, he said.

As far as helicopters go, "the Coast Guard has a very robust fleet," Dragone said. "Some of them need to be upgraded to keep them in service." The French Aerospatiale HH-65 Dolphin short-range recovery helicopter is receiving a new cockpit, control displays and multifunctional flat-panel displays. Flight-management software is being improved, and full-authority digital engine control is being added to provide a greater range of operating conditions with increased safety for the aircrew. Three Dolphins have crashed in service-related accidents since their introduction in 1985.

Two years ago, the Coast Guard agreed to lease eight Italian-designed Agusta A109E Power helicopters--which the service has dubbed MH-68 Makos--to serve as an armed narcotics interdiction squadron, based in Jacksonville, Fla.

Armed with M240G machine guns, .50 caliber sniper rifles, stun guns and entanglement nets, the Makos already have made their marks. In March, the Coast Guard reported that they intercepted three U.S.-bound speedboats laden with more than 13,000 pounds of cocaine.

The Coast Guard also is evaluating the Bell Agusta 609, a civilian version of the troubled MV-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft sought by the U.S. Marines and Air Force Special Operations. Tilt rotors take off and land like helicopters, then fly like fixed wing aircraft. They are faster than traditional helicopters, with more range and cargo capacity.

The Coast Guard's interest in the 609, however, is linked to the fate of the Osprey. Flight testing of that aircraft was halted in 2000 after two crashes killed 23 service members. Defense officials agreed this spring to resume testing, but Edward C. "Pete" Aldridge Jr., undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics, warned: "If we see some problems occurring early in the flight-test program, we may not continue it."

On Capitol Hill, meanwhile, some legislators complained that the Coast Guard's entire Deepwater strategy is too risky, slow and expensive. Said U.S. Sen. Richard Shelby, of Alabama, ranking minority member of the transportation appropriations subcommittee:

"Deepwater is already slipping, even though it hasn't delivered anything but studies and internal machinations. Yet, for the fourth year in a row, we're being asked to appropriate a blank check--this year for $500 million--and being asked to trust an untried, unproven and risky strategy."

Stillman agreed that, given the amount of money and time needed to complete it, Deepwater is hazardous. But he argued that, because of the age and condition of Coast Guard cutters and aircraft, the service has little choice. And, he said, it must succeed. "Failure is not an option."