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Navy Tug Rescues Liberian Fishermen

Navy NewsStand

Story Number: NNS060816-06
8/16/2006

From Sealift Logistics Command Europe

NAPLES, Italy (NNS) -- Military Sealift Command’s (MSC) 226 foot-long fleet ocean tug, USNS Apache (T-ATF 172), rescued seven fishermen whose canoes capsized in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Monrovia, Liberia, Aug. 14.

Apache was two nautical miles west of the harbor entrance Sunday afternoon when the ship came upon five men struggling in the water next to their canoe.

“Several of us saw the overturned boat and people in the water around 2:45 p.m.,” said Apache’s civil service master Capt. Charles Rodriguez. “I immediately called the chief mate to tell him to get out to the site as quickly as possible.”

Apache’s Chief Mate, Troy Bruemmer and Able Seaman Jeremy Guyet were in the harbor aboard the ship’s rigid hull inflatable boat (RHIB) observing pier repair operations, when they received the call for help.

“They were on scene picking the first of the five victims out of the water within 10 minutes,” said Rodriguez. “They hauled the fisherman into the boat, huddled them together and covered them because they appeared to be in the first stages of hypothermia.”

Bruemmer and Guyet were transiting to the port with the canoe’s crew when they saw two more fishermen struggling in the water. After rescuing them, the two crew members returned all seven men to dry land.

This was the second rescue operation Apache conducted in five days. Less than a week earlier, the ship also came to the aid of fellow seafarers at the Port of Monrovia, putting out a fire that was raging aboard the commercial freighter Tahoma Reefer.

Apache has been in Liberia’s capital city of Monrovia since Aug. 9. Sailors from the ship’s embarked Mobile Diving Salvage Unit 2 conducted repairs on the Port of Monrovia’s commercial pier and surveyed the harbor as part of an effort to strengthen the emerging U.S. partnership with that nation.

“The crew is very upbeat,” said Rodriguez about his ship’s response to last week’s events and Navy diver efforts at Monrovia’s pier. “Everyone is excited to be a part of the work being done here in Liberia.”

Apache is one of Military Sealift Command’s four fleet ocean tugs that provide towing, diving platforms and other services to Navy combatant ships at sea.

Apache is currently on a six-month deployment with the U.S. 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean. The ship is one of MSC’s 33 Naval Fleet Auxiliary Force ships, which are civil service-crewed and provide underway replenishment and other direct support to Navy combatant ships at sea. These ships allow Navy vessels to remain at sea, on station and able to perform their mission.

MSC operates not only the Naval Fleet Auxiliary Force, but also 86 other civilian-crewed ships that chart ocean bottoms, conduct undersea surveillance, strategically preposition combat cargo at sea around the world and move military equipment and supplies used by deployed U.S. forces.