Boatswain Kurt Strauch (Ret.) talks Coast Guard firefighting, including the rescue of a commercial fishing crew aboard an 80 foot scalloper on fire off Montauk, New York, the massive effort to save a 180 foot freighter on fire in the Florida Straits, saving the Cutter Gallatin after a fire broke out in dry dock, and extinguishing flames aboard the Polar Star during a voyage to the Antarctic. He also tells of operations at McMurdo Station, serving as an arctic pilot during the tow of a disabled 400 foot cargo ship from the Southern Ocean to New Zealand, migrant interdictions in the South Pacific, and commanding an IMARV on the Potomac in the aftermath of 9/11, a station, and an 87 foot cutter as an enlisted Boatswain’s Mate and Officer in Charge.

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Episode 82: Kurt Strauch - BOSN - Marine Firefighting - Antarctic Ops - Officer in Charge

Get ready to whiten those knuckles and hold fast as we get underway to talk with Coast Guard veterans about the most daring, dangerous, and epic sea stories ever told. Whether facing ruthless men who prey on other mariners or storms that turn calm seas into graveyards, those who go down to the sea and cast off lines enter the most challenging and dangerous environment on earth. Only here will you hear their stories and the lessons gained through their experience.  Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/theyhadtogoout/support

Government

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz (Ret.) talks twelve years at sea aboard six different cutters ranging from red to white to black hulls, icebreaking as a newly minted ensign, command of a cutter defending the approaches to New York after 9/11, running high seas search and rescue aboard polar icebreakers, leading the service’s recruit training center and its academy, serving at the highest levels of leadership as the aid to the Secretary of Transportation, and her new book “Breaking Ice and Breaking Glass: Leading in Uncharted Waters”. Learn more at https://sandrastosz.com/book/breaking-ice-and-breaking-glass/ #uscg #coastguard #icebreaking #admiral #military #seaservice #veteran

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Episode 90 - Sandra Stosz - Vice Admiral (Ret.) - Icebreaking - Cutter CO

For this episode we welcome our first ever Yeoman to the show and he does not disappoint. CAPT John Marks (Ret.) talks adventures in the South Pacific including visits to the leper colony on Molokai and a murder at a remote LORAN station, running a Miss Ocean Station contest with flight stewardesses from the middle of the North Atlantic, how the concept of “member’s responsibility” developed along with the Yeoman correspondence course, the punches and sponges of the first ever Servicewide Exam, becoming a Chief Petty Officer, Officer Candidate School, surviving the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon, developing NORTHCOM, and rising from an E2 to an O6 to lead the post 9/11 port security grant program. You don’t want to miss this one.

#uscg #coastguard #military #veteran #veterans #armedforces

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Episode 89 - John Marks - Captain (Ret.) - Chief Yeoman

Former LCDR Lee Fanning talks service as a Flight Surgeon at Air Station San Francisco, responding on his first day of duty to the crash landing of a 747 with 300 souls aboard, dodging pine trees and traversing coastal cliffs to save the life of an injured hiker, a violent air hijacking, and flying missions as aircrew aboard the Sikorsky HH52A. To hear more check out Doc Fanning’s book “Rescues from the Sky” available now at https://rescuesfromtheskybyleewaltersmd.com/ #uscg #coastguard #theyhadtogoout

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Episode 88 - Lee Fanning - LCDR - Flight Surgeon - Sikorsky HH52A

Chief Boatswains Mate Jeff Rusiecki (Ret.) talks being at the helm for the attempted rescue of the fishing vessel Sea King as she foundered on the Columbia River Bar, how that case connected him to the survivor of a similar tragedy from the 1960s involving the loss of three motor lifeboats and several crewmen; servicing aids to navigation along the remote Alaskan coastline, seizing the first go fast under the Zero Tolerance policy, and training a new generation of surfmen at the National Motor Lifeboat School.

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Episode 87 - Jeff Rusiecki - BMC (Ret.) - Surfman - FV Sea King - National Motor Lifeboat School

Former MK Jim Morphew talks a near decade of service on the Gulf Coast, two tours at one of the service’s least requested duty stations in Grand Isle, Louisiana; interdicting tons of marijuana in the opening days of the War on Drugs; the sights, sounds, and emotions of the mass migration from Cuba known as the Mariel Boatlift; cruising aboard a prototype Surface Effect Ship (SES); and overcoming post traumatic stress with the help of Veterans Affairs. 

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Episode 82: Kurt Strauch - BOSN - Marine Firefighting - Antarctic Ops - Officer in Charge

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