‘Hungry Horse’ Put to Pasture after 40 Years
USCGC MUSTANG (WPB 1310)
An early “A-series” 110-foot Island-class patrol boat, USCGC Mustang (WPB 1310), was the 10th of her class to join the service and had a 15-year design lifespan.
Commissioned in September 1986, she was named after Mustang Island off the coast of Corpus Christi, Texas but, in typical Government logic, was immediately sent to the Pacific and was the first of her class stationed on the West Coast. Stationed at Seward, Alaska ever since, she is one of the few cutters to have remained at the same homeport their entire career.
Seward, Alaska (Feb. 15, 1996)–The Coast Guard Cutter Mustang (WPB 1310) is moored at a Seward, Alaska, pier. USCG photo by SS2 Mike Brasch
She even went to the call of other cutters.
Juneau, AK (Apr.4, 2000)–The 110-foot Coast Guard Cutter Mustang (WPB 1310) tows the Homer-based Island Class patrol boat Roanoke Island (WPB 1346) to Juneau after the Roanoke Island’s engines were shut down in the Gulf of Alaska, resulting from pumps that overheated. (U.S. Coast Guard photo courtesy Cutter Roanoke Island)
After nearly 40 years patrolling the Gulf of Alaska and Prince William Sound and responding to an average of 200 SAR calls and 2,000 LE sorties, the USCG is finished with the cutter. She was decommissioned at Seward on Tuesday.
Her fellow A-series sistership, USCGC Naushon (WPB-1311), was retired in Homer last month. Between just 2016 when she was moved there and her decommissioning, Naushon chalked up 50 SAR cases and 900 LE sorties out of Homer.
Coast Guard Cutter Naushon (WPB 1311) moored at a pier during the cutter’s decommissioning ceremony in Homer, Alaska, March 21, 2025. Naushon has been stationed in Homer since 2016 and has since responded to over 50 search-and-rescue cases and completed nearly 900 law enforcement sorties. U.S. Coast Guard photo by Seaman Sydney Sharpe
The last of the 110s in Alaska is USCGC Liberty (WPB-1334), which has spent her 33-year career at Juneau and Valdez.
The Coast Guard is replacing the aging Island-class patrol boats with the new 158-foot Sentinel-class Fast Response Cutters (FRCs), which feature enhanced capability to meet service needs. There are currently four FRC’s homeported in Alaska (USCGC John McCormick, Anthony Petit, and Bailey Barco at Ketchikan and John Witherspoon at Kodiak), with two more scheduled for delivery in the near future.
It is expected that both Mustang and Naushon will be sent to the Coast Guard Yard in Baltimore and refitted for further service, heading down to South America as military aid for a second career.
It seems, after decades of polar service, a stint in warmer waters for these old cutters is overdue.
With that, check out this recent video of the Coast Guard Waterfront Operations and Training Center (WOTC) that sits across Curtis Creek from CG Yard, which has recently finished all scheduled FY24 decommissionings and lay-ups in support of the Force Alignment Initiative, which took 13 badly needed cutters out of operation.
Visible are at least three Reliance-class 210s, eight 87s, and six 110s