Posted on 12/02/2009 8:39:24 AM PST by GATOR NAVY
The storm mucking up Southcentral Alaska this week battered a far-flung U.S. Coast Guard outpost in the Aleutians over the weekend with hurricane-force winds, according to the National Weather Service.
Out in Attu, the crew of the Coast Guard's Long-Range Navigation Station reported sustained winds of 125 mph with gusts hitting 178 mph over the weekend. The station also got more than a foot and a half of snow.
The gusts, equivalent to the winds of a Category 5 hurricane, damaged a communications antenna, which broke free from three securing mounts, the Coast Guard said.
The station's crew has been making repairs and has spent more than 100 hours on snow removal.
There are 20 active-duty personnel based at the station on year-long assignments.
(Excerpt) Read more at adn.com ...
Capt. Obvious says "It would be a veeeeeery long year".
When I was in the Coast Guard I had the chance to visit Attu. As places go it wasn’t to bad. The worst part of it is that you were FORBIDDEN to leave the confines of the station or the Runway.
Mind you it was for your own good. The damn place is crazy dangerous with WWII explosives and munitions from both the Japanese occupation and our bombing the place.
I’ve heard but am unable to confirm that some of the EOD people are sent there as a graduation exercise to clean up and acre or so at a time.
And as far as a bad place to go as in having a detailer mad at you? Well I always thought that French Frigate Shoals was by far much worse.
What’s an ISU? And what are you going to do if a 175 mph typhoon blows you all the way to Vladivostok? You don’t speak a word of Russian!
Anyway, the article says there are only 20 personnel there. Do you really want to be posted someplace with 19 people who think you’re nuts?
Well, I’m already here with 175 people who are of similar opinion. Aside from four or five who actually read things, and a few officers. Most of the Seamen and Fireman think I’m nuts. The JO’s don’t. Maybe it’s because I only talk to them occasionally.
Actually, you might have a better chance of running into several serious readers in a post like Attu. It would be the kind of place where there’s not much else to do. Almost like being on a fire-watch tower, only colder and not *quite* as solitary.
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