uscg photo
An MH-65 Dolphin helicopter approaches USCGC Dauntless during a training exercise in the Gulf of Mexico in 2016.
courtesy cwo-ret. charlie bozeman, uscg photo
marijuana bales had been successfully offloaded, but that the Big L’s engines had broken down. Adventurer III had taken the sportsfisherman in tow and was headed towards Miami. At this news, Captain Millradt ordered Dauntless to charge in at flank speed, nearly eighteen knots. When he had closed to a range of 600 yards, Millradt turned on his navigational lights and illuminated both vessels with the cutter’s twelve-inch searchlights, and directed the Adventurer III to heave to. They were in position 25° 29.3’ N 079° 09’ W, about thirty-five miles from the closest point on the Florida Coast and approximately twelve miles from North Cat Cay in the Bahamas.
One of the Dauntless’s small boats briefly examined the Adventurer III, then proceeded to the Big L. As his boat drew near, Ensign Penn Shade ordered the four persons aboard the Big L to muster aft in the cockpit, while Shade’s four-person team would board at the bow. Shade thought he heard splashes on the far side of the boat, and hoped that it was the sound of weapons being tossed overboard. Shade and Gunner’s Mate First Class (GM1) Charlie Bozeman were first aboard. As they worked their way aft on the narrow deck on either side of the cabin, both smelled the distinctive odor of bulk marijuana. Looking through the cabin’s windows, Bozeman could see bales lying in plain view. Bozeman had learned how to conduct a hostile boarding while serving aboard the USCGC Spencer (WPG-36) in the waters off Vietnam four years earlier. The Spencer had interdicted dozens of small vessels suspected of smuggling arms and ammunition from North Vietnam and detained fiftytwo suspected Viet Cong supporters for interrogation by the South Vietnamese military. It was the cadre of old hands like him who would ensure the safety of Coast Guardmen and women until the service could develop official doctrine and establish a program to train its law enforcement personnel in boarding tactics and procedures.
When Shade got back to the cockpit, he informed the smugglers that they were under arrest. One of them reached into a pocket. GM1 Bozeman immediately prepared to fire a round from his Remington 870 shotgun. Not once had Bozeman had to shoot anyone during a boarding in Vietnam, and he hoped he would not have to start now. To his relief, the smuggler shakily pulled out a cigarette lighter. BNDD agents were then ferried over to assist with handcuffing the prisoners and searching the boat. They would find a total of 1,130 pounds of marijuana bales in the cabin and engine spaces. With Roy Warren and the undercover agents still aboard Adventurer III, the Dauntless crew gave it a cursory look and then released them. After the prisoners were transferred to the Dauntless, Captain Millradt sent over a four-person custody crew led by his executive officer, LCDR Rob Swain, to navigate the vessel back to Miami. His student engineer, LT R. E. Cox, and Engineman First Class J. Miller were able to resuscitate one engine and keep it going for the 45-nautical-mile trip. Even with calm seas, the engine smoked excessively and the smell of diesel exhaust and smoldering oil-soaked insulation, not to mention the bales of marijuana that had been packed around the engine, made for an uncomfortable ride.
The Big L starkly illuminated by the Dauntless’s searchlight in the pitch black night just prior to being boarded. Two of the smugglers can be seen on the flying bridge. 30
SEA HISTORY 167, SUMMER 2019