USCGC Coos Bay ( WAVP - 376 ) USCGC " Coos Bay " ( WAVP - 376 ) , later WHEC - 376 , was a " Casco " - class United States Coast Guard cutter in service from 1949 to 1966 . Construction and U . S . Navy service . " Coos Bay " began life as the United States Navy " Barnegat " - class seaplane tender USS " Coos Bay " ( AVP - 25 ) . She was laid down on 15 August 1941 by Lake Washington Shipyard at Houghton , Washington , launched on 15 May 1942 , and commissioned into the U . S . Navy on 15 May 1943 . She served in the Central Pacific and Southwest Pacific during World War II , and on occupation duty in Japan postwar . She was decommissioned on 30 April 1946 and placed in the Atlantic Reserve Fleet at Orange , Texas . Transferred to the United States Coast Guard . " Barnegat " - class ships were very reliable and seaworthy and had good habitability , and the Coast Guard viewed them as ideal for ocean station duty , in which they would perform weather reporting and search and rescue tasks , once they were modified by having a balloon shelter added aft and having oceanographic equipment , an oceanographic winch , and a hydrographic winch installed . The Navy loaned " Coos Bay " to the Coast Guard on 4 January 1949 . After she underwent conversion for service as a weather reporting ship , the Coast Guard commissioned her as USCGC " Coos Bay " ( WAVP - 376 ) in May 1949 . U . S . Coast Guard service . " Coos Bay " was stationed at Portland , Maine , throughout her Coast Guard career . Her primary duty was to serve on ocean stations in the Atlantic Ocean to gather meteorological data . While on duty in one of these stations , she was required to patrol a 210 - square - mile ( 544 - square - kilometer ) area for three weeks at a time , leaving the area only when physically relieved by another Coast Guard cutter or in the case of a dire emergency . While on station , she acted as an aircraft check point at the point of no return , a relay point for messages from ships and aircraft , as a source of the latest weather information for passing aircraft , as a floating oceanographic laboratory , and as a search - and - rescue ship for downed aircraft and vessels in distress , and engaged in law enforcement operations . " Coos Bay " rescued the 10 - man crew of a downed U . S . Navy patrol aircraft midway between Bermuda and the Azores on 27 February 1953 . On 11 March 1953 she assisted the commercial tanker " Angy " . On 26 January 1955 , " Coos Bay " rescued six crewmen of a downed United States Air Force transport aircraft about east of Bermuda . In December 1960 the Coos Bay rescued four inexperienced seamen aboard the R / V Grace ( operated by the Lamont Geological Observatory ) about southwest of Bermuda . The Grace was towed back to Bermuda in heavy seas . On 19 February 1964 , " Coos Bay " rescued survivors from the British merchant ship " Ambassador " in the North Atlantic . " Coos Bay " was reclassified as a high endurance cutter and redesignated WHEC - 376 on 1 May 1966 . Decommissioning and disposal . The Coast Guard decommissioned " Coos Bay " at Boston , Massachusetts , on 1 September 1966 and berthed her at Curtis Bay in Maryland , then returned her to the U . S . Navy on 2 September 1967 . She was stricken from the Naval Vessel Register . The Navy towed " Coos Bay " from Curtis Bay to a point in the Atlantic off the coast of Virginia where on 9 January 1968 guided missile destroyer USS " Claude V . Ricketts " ( DDG - 5 ) , one other Navy ship , and 35 aircraft sank her as a target .