To say that the North Shore of Alaska is a remote place is an understatement. The North Shore borders the Chukchi Sea and the Beaufort Sea, two marginal seas of the Arctic Ocean. Even in the middle of July, the waters in the area are still icy with large ice floes in many areas. It is not hard to see that conducting search and rescue, one of the Coast Guard’s core missions in the area, presents unusual challenges.
It was through that ice that Coast Guard Cutter Healy made a path last week to conduct an interagency search and rescue exercise. The exercise was designed to test new technologies using unmanned aerial systems and identify benefits to cooperative search efforts between federal and industry partners. Read More