US Coast Guard cutter Munro to enter service in April next year

The U.S. Coast Guard announced that commissioning of the service’s sixth national security cutter, Munro, is scheduled for April 1, 2017, at the Smith Cove Cruise Terminal in Seattle.

The cutter, which will be homeported in Alameda, California, is named after the Coast Guard’s only Medal of Honor recipient, Signalman First Class Douglas A. Munro.

The timing of the announcement coincides with the annual memorial service for Munro, a Cle Elum, Washington-native, taking place Tuesday at Laurel Hill Memorial Park in Cle Elum. Munro died on Guadalcanal Sept. 27, 1942, after volunteering to evacuate a detachment of U.S. Marines during the battle with Japanese forces holding the Pacific Island.

Each year, on Sept. 27, more than 100 Coast Guard men and women, along with representatives from the Seattle-area chapters of the Coast Guard Warrant Officer Associations, the Coast Guard Chief Petty Officers Association and the Coast Guard Combat Veterans Association, gather at Laurel Hill Memorial Park to honor the sacrifice and memory of Munro.

Munro completed builder’s trials in August 2016, in the Gulf of Mexico. Designed to replace the 378‐foot Hamilton-class high-endurance cutters that entered service in the 1960s, Legend-class are 418 feet long with a 54-foot beam and displace 4,500 tons with a full load. They have a top speed of 28 knots, a range of 12,000 miles, an endurance of 60 days and a crew of 110.

Shipbuilder Huntington Ingalls Industries has delivered the first five NSCs and has two more under construction, with Munro (WMSL 755), scheduled for delivery in the fourth quarter of this year. Kimball (WMSL 756) is scheduled for delivery in 2018, and Midgett (WMSL 757) in 2019.