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Two days before NFL player Marquis Cooper took a doomed fishing trip with three friends in Florida Gulf Coast waters, a friend urged him to buy a life-saving device used to locate boats in distress. Cooper hadn't heard of the gadget, an emergency position indicating radio beacon (EPIRB). And he didn't purchase one before his excursion on Saturday, according to the St. Petersburg Times.

WASHINGTON, March 4, 2009 – The Coast Guard is used to being in high demand, overworked and underequipped, but the pursuit to modernize in the midst of fiscal ambiguity is the real challenge, Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Thad W. Allen said yesterday. “The fact that demand for Coast Guard services exceeds our capacity has always been the case,” Allen said during his State of the Coast Guard address at the National Press Center here. “But as the nation faces fiscal uncertainty, we'll have to make difficult financial choices and manage resources to buy down risk in the most critical areas.”...

As the Coast Guard ended its search for three missing football players whose boat tipped over in high Florida seas, the lone survivor said two of those lost gave up after hours in the frigid water and the third tried to swim to safety. South Florida player Nick Schuyler told investigators that all four of the friends on a fishing excursion were initially wearing life vests and clinging to the 21-foot boat belonging to Oakland Raiders linebacker Marquis Cooper. But two to four hours after the boat capsized, one of the NFL players removed his life jacket and let...

The Coast Guard called off its search for three missing football players at sunset Tuesday. The news came after crews combed choppy waters off the Florida Gulf Coast for a third full day since NFL players Marquis Cooper and Corey Smith and a third friend William Bleakley disappeared. Their fishing boat capsized in stormy seas Saturday evening. One of the four on the excursion, Nick Schuyler, survived.

Nick Schuyler was taken via helicopter to Tampa General Hospital. Officials are still searching for former Buccaneers Corey Smith and Marquis Cooper, along with ex-USF football player William Bleakley.

DEVELOPING: The Coast Guard has found an overturned boat with one person clinging to it in the search for missing NFL players. Search crews found the boat about 30 miles off the Gulf Coast of Florida. Corey Smith, a free-agent defensive end who played for the Detroit Lions last season, and Marquis Cooper, an Oakland Raiders linebacker, are two of the four people aboard the boat that didn't return from a fishing trip Saturday. Will Bleakley and Nick Schuyler, both former University of South Florida players, were also aboard. The identity of the man hanging on to the boat could...

UPDATE: A family member tells us that the Coast Guard has found a boat with one person clinging to the side. We will have the details posted here as we learn them. http://www.tampabays10.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=101513&catid=8

<p>Overturned boat found in Gulf of Mexico with 1 person clinging to it. No word if it is one of the missing NFL players.</p>

Detroit Lions defensive end Corey Smith and Oakland Raiders linebacker Marquis Cooper were among four boaters missing Sunday off Florida's Gulf Coast, the Coast Guard and Smith's agent said. Smith and Cooper were on a 21-foot vessel that left Clearwater Pass on Saturday morning for a fishing trip and did not return as expected, the Coast Guard said Sunday. Crews used a helicopter and a 47-foot boat to search a 750-square mile area west of Clearwater Pass on Sunday -snip-

The Coast Guard is in search of a fishing boat 50 miles off the coast of Clearwater, FL. Reportedly, the boat is carrying three NFL players, including one who plays for the Detroit Lions. The 21-foot boat apparently left Clearwater Pass on Saturday with four people aboard and likely encountered choppy conditions in the Gulf of Mexico.

WASHINGTON, Feb. 18, 2009 – The Coast Guard is actively engaged in implementing the president’s counter-piracy action plan, senior Coast Guard officials said. Capt. Charles Michel, chief of the Office of Maritime and International Law, and Capt. Michael Giglio, chief of law enforcement, discussed the Coast Guard’s international counter-piracy efforts yesterday with bloggers and online journalists. “Piracy goes back many, many years -- many thousands of years, actually -- about the time that man started first taking onto the water in ships,” Michel said. “Piracy is essentially an act of violence or depredation conducted on the high seas from...

CLEVELAND - The Coast Guard says several hundred people are trapped on a slab of ice about 8 miles wide that has broken free and is floating away from the Ohio shoreline of Lake Erie.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — The U.S. Coast Guard says it will no longer respond to distress calls sent by analog signal starting Feb. 1. The agency is switching to digital frequencies and says the new equipment cannot process signals transmitting on 121.5 or 243.0 MHz. The Coast Guard said Wednesday in a statement that the switch to digital will provide a more stable and powerful signal that could improve response times. The agency said mariners and aviators should upgrade their equipment to include a digital 406-MHz distress radio beacon and register it [snip]

AT SEA ABOARD USS SAN ANTONIO, Jan. 21, 2009 – Navy and Coast Guard boarding teams are working together to ensure safe operations in the Gulf of Aden, Arabian Sea, Red Sea and Indian Ocean as part of Combined Task Force 151, a multinational counter-piracy task force. Coast Guard and Navy teams board suspect vessels to detect, deter and disrupt piracy activities. "This is a law-enforcement operation to deter piracy and make the waters safe for all nations," Coast Guard Lt. j.g. Greg Ponzi, officer in charge for Coast Guard Law Enforcement Detachment 405, said. Each boarding team for CTF...

The Coast Guard and National Transportation Safety Board released this Coast Guard video of US Airways flight 1549 landing in the Hudson River . . .

Via Poweline. Shameless plug.

Click here for video. Crash happens at about 2:02 minutes into the video.

Surveillance camera images have emerged of the moment a US Airways Airbus A320 ditched into the Hudson River in New York, capturing the aircraft as it slowed to a halt and the initial moments of evacuation. The 10min section of video, from a US Coast Guard vessel traffic service camera, covers the time between 15:29 and 15:39 on 15 January. US Airways flight 1549's emergency ditching occurred at 15:31, about 2min 2s into the video section. http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=9e6_1232166872 It shows the aircraft decelerating on the surface of the river, before zooming in to capture the evacuation process - with passengers clambering...

PHILADELPHIA- On Jan. 17, 2009, the Coast Guard will establish five temporary security zones for a scheduled railway transit by high-ranking government officials. The security zones will be in effect 8 a.m. until 4 p.m. on Jan. 17, 2009, and include the following areas: * Delaware River, shoreline to shoreline beginning at the Walt Whitman Bridge south to the Delaware Memorial Bridge. * Schuylkill River, shoreline to shoreline beginning at the mouth and ending at the Fairmont Park Dam in Philadelphia. * Christina River, shoreline to shoreline beginning at the mouth and ending at the public dock at Ship Yard...

This week the Coast Guard and the Air Force announced an increase, while the Army, Navy and Marine Corps announced a decrease.  The net collective result is 1,551 more reservists activated since last week.               At any given time, services may activate some units and individuals while deactivating others, making it possible for these figures to either increase or decrease.  The total number currently on active duty from the Army National Guard and Army Reserve is 96,803; Navy Reserve, 5,910; Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve, 12,420; Marine Corps Reserve, 8,253; and the Coast Guard Reserve, 906. This brings...