Bering Strait, 1948
WAVP
/ WHEC-382
Radio Call Sign: NBYG
Bering Strait was named for the body of water between Siberia and Alaska that connects the Arctic Ocean and Bering Sea.
Builder:
Lake Washington Shipyards, Houghton, WA
Commissioned: 19
Jul 1944 (USN)
14
Dec 1948 (USCG)
Decommissioned:
1 Jan 1971
Disposition: Transferred
to South Vietnam
Length:
311’7” oa; 299’11”bp
Navigation
Draft: 13’1” max (1964)
Beam:
41’ max
Displacement:
2,498 tons, full load (1966)
Main
Engines: Fairbanks-Morse,
direct reversing diesels
SHP:
6,400
Performance,
Maximum Sustained: 17.3
kts, 10,138-mi radius (1966)
Performance, Economic: 10.0
kts, 20,000-mi radius (1966)
Fuel
Capacity: 166,430
Complement:
10 officers, 3 warrants, 138 men (1966)
Electronics: Radar (1 each): AN/SPA-4A; AN/SPS-23; ID-445/SPS;
IP-307/SPS; IP-452/SPS; Mk-34
M11 ; AN/SPS-29B; AN/UPA-24A;
AN/UPX-1A
Sonar:
Armament:
1 x 5”/38 Mk-12 M1; 2 x .50 caliber; 1 x Mk-10 M1 A/S projector;
Ship's
history:
Bering Strait was stationed in Seattle, Washington, from 14 December 1948 to 1954. She was used for law enforcement, ocean station, and search and rescue operations in the Pacific. From 1954 to 1 January 1971, she was stationed at Honolulu, Hawaii and conducted the same tasks.
In
January 1956 she medevaced an injured seaman from M/V Madaket.
On 13 February 1960, she provided emergency repairs to the Japanese training
ship Toyama Maru off Palmyra Island after 1 ton of cement patch
material had been air-dropped. Bering Strait conducted
oceanographic experiments while serving on Ocean Station VICTOR in December
1964 and January 1965 and again from 19 June to 10 July 1966. On 13
January 1965, she relieved the disabled cutter Matagorda and stood by
the disabled Liberian M/V Saint Helena 1,000 miles northwest of
Midway Island until a commercial tug arrived. From 4 May 1967 to 18
February 1968 assigned to Coast Guard Squadron Three, Vietnam. From 24
February to 1 March 1970 Bering Strait fought fire on the Panamanian
M/V Grand Ocean in the mid-Pacific. She was reassigned to Coast
Guard Squadron Three, Vietnam, from 17 May to 31 December 1970.
Bering Strait was transferred to South Vietnam on 1 January 1971 and renamed Tran Quang Khai. She fled to Philippines at the fall of South Vietnam. She was then incorporated into the Philippine Navy as Diego Silang until she was laid up as non-operational in June of 1985.
She was "disposed of in July 1990" (by scrapping?).
Click here to view a photo of the Bering Strait in service in Vietnam.
Click here to view a photo of the Bering Strait in Vietnam, bow-on shot.
SOURCES:
Bering Strait, Cutter Subject File, USCG Historian's Office
Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships, Vol. I (1959), pp. 118-119.
"Listings: AVP's"; compiled and written by LCDR J. P. Smith, USCGR
Robert Scheina, U.S. Coast Guard Cutters & Craft, 1946-1990 (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1990), pp. 10-16.
Ship's Characteristics Card: USCGC Bering Strait, 5 July 1966.