Monday, May 5, 2014

U.S. Coast Guard FOIA release - Part 2





This section is a copy of correspondence sent to Ohio Congressional representatives from The Last Patrol Museum Group of Toledo. This message contains critical information that was forwarded to STORIS Museum and The Last Patrol from Jay Barrett of KMXT radio in Kodiak. This information was sent as a pass-through. It was originally received as a news tip sent to Mr. Barrett by a representative of a major U.S. ship recycling company who had read about the STORIS’ sale and pending export to Mexico in an AP wire story. The wire story originated with Jay Barrett’s news stories detailing STORIS' imminent export. The ship recycling expert recognized the illegality of the STORIS export and attempted to bring it to the attention of various government officials within the Coast Guard, EPA and GSA but was ignored. If the ship recycling company is forced by the federal government to comply with federal laws related to environmental concerns and ship recycling in the U.S., what makes the U.S. Federal Government exempt from following those very same rules they impose on the ship recycling companies? The STORIS export could potentially be a precedent-setting loophole or backdoor for the government to get rid of ships that don’t meet environmental standards.

This message did make its way to the STORIS Museum and to me late on Saturday, Oct. 26, the night after STORIS’ tow left the SBRF. It was this message that prompted the last ditch efforts to save the ship which has now evolved into this effort to find the truth about STORIS’ sale and export. As explained elsewhere, STORIS was in otherwise excellent physical condition, the haz-mat on board was contained and she would have made an excellent museum ship and training vessel.

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