This Day in U.S. Coast Guard History – December 6

1917- The French freighter Mont Blanc, loaded with 5,000 tons of high explosives, collided with the Norwegian steamer Imo in the harbor of Halifax, Nova Scotia.  The resulting fire detonated the munitions, killing 1,635 people and leveling much of Halifax and its environs.  Coast Guardsmen from the CGC Morrill were landed to provide assistance.  This disaster led to the creation of captains of the ports for the major U.S. ports.  The Coast Guard was tasked with the new duty.

1918-Surfman L. E. Ashton of Station No. 305 in Nome, Alaska, departed his station with a dog sled and team loaded with medical supplies along with one other surfman on an expedition to assist natives who were suffering from influenza at Cape Prince of Wales, 160 miles from Nome and at villages between the two settlements.  He arrived at Cape Prince of Wales on 13 December, where he found 122 natives sick and 157 dead of the illness.  He converted the schoolhouse into a hospital, and the post office into a dispensary and "otherwise perfected an organization by means of which he was able to care for all the sick."  He began burying the dead on 11 January and by 20 February when "the epidemic had spent its force" he returned to his station in Nome, arriving there on 1 March 1919.

1944-Coast Guardsmen participated in the landings at Ormoc, Philippine Islands.

1946-The number of Coast Guardsmen on active duty had been dropped to 22,156 in order to meet budgetary requirements. Many lifeboat stations had to be placed in a limited caretaker or inactive status and some vessels tied up because they lacked complements .

1953- Coast Guard search and rescue facilities at the Naval Base in Bermuda were instrumental in rescuing four survivors and recovering 17 bodies from the Cuban aircraft Cubana 471, which crashed on take-off from the airport at Kindley Field, Bermuda.

1999- The cutter Munro intercepted the vessel Wing Fung Lung, a vessel loaded with more than 250 Chinese migrants headed for the Guatemala/El Salvador border.  After refusing permission to board, the Munro tracked the vessel for three days when lookouts spotted flares over the ship.  When the Munro's small boat approached, panicked migrants began jumping into the water.  They were pulled to safety and returned to the Wing Fun Lung while boarding parties finally went aboard the crowded vessel.  Someone apparently tried to scuttle the vessel and the boarding teams were able to stop the flooding and dewater the engine room.  The threat to the Munro crewmen on the vessel was made worse because the migrants had not been fed or had water for more than a day.  They were at the point of total rebellion, according to the Munro's boarding team members.  Other boarding teams from the CGC Hamilton then arrived and helped to control the situation.  The vessel was finally taken into Puerto Quetzal, Guatemala, where the migrants were taken into custody by INS agents.  The master of the vessel was arrested.

(Source: USCG Historian’s Office)