Patrols keeping watchful eye on Potomac.

• Author: Kennedy, Harold

Puttering along in the Boundary Channel of the Potomac River, near the Pentagon, the operator of the slow-moving dinghy warily watched the sleek, red and gray Coast Guard response boat as it approached. Would he be stopped and questioned? Would his boat be searched?

As it turned out, he had nothing to worry about. "Ordinarily, we don't do anything unless we see something suspicious," said Lt. j.g. Chris White, executive officer of Coast Guard Station Washington, one of the service's newest and smallest bases.

Coast Guard crews are trained to be watchful, White told National Defense during a recent familiarization cruise along the river. "Not every terrorist threat is going to have a sticker taped on it saying, 'bomb.'

"For example, a boat tied up under the 14th Street Bridge, with nobody around--we need to pay attention to stuff like that," he said. "Some of the piles have ladders going from the water right up to the bridge decks."

The Coast Guard began patrols along the Potomac in the wake of 9/11. The goal was to improve waterborne protection for the nation's capital, said Lt. Frank Del Rosso, the station's commander.

Originally, the patrols were conducted by reservists and temporary-duty boat crews, with personnel rotating every three weeks to three months. During the first two years of operation, more than 200 Coasties, as members of the service are called, performed the patrols.

"In those days, we were underway 24/7," said Petty Officer 1st Class Bruce Walker, who arrived on scene the day after the 9/11 attacks.

Eventually, however, the need for a permanent presence became clear, and earlier this year the Coast Guard established the Washington station, with 26 men and women crowded temporarily into a tiny space on the waterfront at Boiling Air Force Base. At first, the patrols were conducted with a 41-foot utility boat and a 21-foot Aid-to-Navigation craft. "We found the 41 footer too much boat, and the 21 footer too little," Walker said.

Since then, the station has been assigned two brand-new 25-foot, Defender Class Homeland Security Response Boats. "We're scheduled to get a third one around the middle of March, and possibly a fourth boat later," said Del Rosso.

The boats are part of a package of 700 such vessels that the Coast Guard agreed last year to buy from SAFE Boats International, of Port Orchard, Wash., for $145 million, or $180,000 each. The vessels can be deployed by road, on trailers, or by air, on C-130 aircraft.

With twin...