Northwest Watch helps Coast Guard save lives

By: JO2 Ryan Hill
Staff Writer
Friday, May 6, 2005

With more than 3,000 miles of shoreline in the state of Washington, keeping track of boating safety and water hazards can be a daunting task.
The Coast Guard has initiated a program called Northwest Watch to make tracking these large masses of water a more efficient undertaking.

Northwest Watch is a program involving Coast Guard, Coast Guard Auxiliary members and civilian volunteers that live along these masses of water, including the Puget Sound. Participants of the program have their home addresses represented on a map of the Puget Sound in the Coast Guards computer system. When the Coast Guard gets a call about any trouble in the water they check their computer and see if they have any volunteers in that area.

If they do, they call the volunteers and ask them to check on the situation. If the call ends up being a false alarm, the Coast Guard saves money and manpower by not deploying to the area. If the call is a real situation, the Coast Guard is able to dispatch their resources to the situation in a more efficient matter.
“With the navigational work, storms and weather we can’t be everywhere at once,” said Coast Guard Public Affairs Specialist 3rd Class Adam Eggers. “Northwest Watch helps us prioritize while still maintaining a level of readiness with our units. It can really help avoid incidents and accidents.”

With the Northwest Watch program currently running in the states of Washington and Oregon, the Coast Guard estimates a monthly savings of approximately $5,000. Increasing the amount of volunteers in the program will lead to more estimated savings. There are currently 124 members of Northwest Watch with approximately fifty of them joining up in the past two months.

“We would love to have a heavy saturation of volunteers in areas of recreation, beaches, commercial fishing areas, tanker traffic areas and river bars,” said Eggers. “People living along the waterways have a vested interest in what goes on. Nobody wants an oil spill on their beach and nobody wants to hear a neighbor died in a boating accident. It’s very easy to help. We call them on most situations unless they see something first. For the everyday person, it gives them an opportunity to have a large impact on saving somebody’s life.”

The success of Northwest Watch has led the Coast Guard to actively promote the program in an effort to gain more volunteers. They are currently working on plans to pitch it to area boating clubs and other organizations involving activities on the Puget Sound.
“It’s our job to educate the public,” said Eggers. “We as a government agency have a responsibility to spend our money wisely. The National Response Plan has called for an implementation of citizen involvement. We want all the volunteers we can get because there is no such thing as too much information. It’s a win-win situation. The Coast Guard gets the information they need to do their jobs and the volunteers get to be involved in something positive.”

The Coast Guard is currently looking for any volunteers who can help in the Northwest Watch program. They are specifically looking for people who live in residences overlooking shoreline and navigated waterways.