USCGC Alex Haley (WMEC-39)

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USS Edenton (ATS-1)
Career United States Navy Jack
Ordered:
Laid down: 28 March 1967
Launched: 15 May 1968
Commissioned: 23 March 1971 (USN)
10 July 1999 (USCG)
Decommissioned: 29 March 1996 (USN)
Struck: 29 December 1997 (USN)
Fate:
General characteristics
Displacement: 2,592 tons (lt), 3,484 tons (fl)
Length: 283 ft
Beam: 50 ft
Draft: 17 ft
Propulsion: 4 Caterpillar diesels,
twin screws,
6,800 shp
Speed: 18 knots
Range: 10,000 miles
Complement: 10 Officers
100 Enlisted
4 Aircrew
Armament: 2 × 25 mm,
2 x .50 caliber machine guns.
Motto: "Find the good and praise it."

The United States Coast Guard cutter Alex Haley (WMEC-39) is a former U.S. Navy vessel that was recommissioned for Coast Guard duty on July 10, 1999. It was first commissioned as the USS Edenton (ATS-1), an Edenton-class salvage and rescue ship on January 23, 1971. In 1995, Edenton won the Marjorie Sterrett Battleship Fund Award for the Atlantic Fleet.

USS Edenton, before becoming the Alex Haley
Enlarge
USS Edenton, before becoming the Alex Haley

The conversion from a salvage ship to a Coast Guard cutter involved the removal of the stern towing machine, forward crane, and A-frame, and the installation of a flight-deck, retractable hangar, and air-search radar. Additionally her four aging Paxman diesel engines were replaced with four 16 cylinder Caterpillars.

The cutter was named after author and journalist Alex Haley, the first chief journalist of the Coast Guard, and the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Roots: The Saga of an American Family. Haley served in the Coast Guard for 20 years.

Her current home port is Kodiak, Alaska from where she carries out her Fishery Law Enforcement and Search and Rescue primary missions.


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