PORT ANGELES — With the crew of the Coast Guard cutter Cuttyhunk standing in formation on a sunny lawn Friday morning, new Lt. James D. Stoffer issued his final orders as their skipper.
“Take care of the boat, take care of each other,” Stoffer told them.
Then, with a salute, Stoffer turned over the command to the Cuttyhunk’s newest commanding officer, Chief Warrant Officer James A. Robson, who returns to the cutter for his second time as its skipper.
“You see the smile on my face,” Robson, 45, said. “That’s ’cause I’m back.”
Robson returns to the Cuttyhunk from serving as first lieutenant aboard the Coast Guard icebreaker Healy, while Stoffer, 44, faces a new assignment that takes him into the Middle East and the Iraq war.
With his promotion Friday from chief warrant officer to lieutenant, Stoffer heads to Bahrain for a one-year assignment as the operations officer for Patrol Boat Forces Southwest Asia.
There, he will work with six Coast Guard patrol boats, four Navy patrol boats and support staff that provide protection through the Persian Gulf, around oil rigs, and at the ports of Kuwait and Iraq.
‘I needed to do’
“I felt it was something that I needed to do,” Stoffer said after the ceremony.
The traditional change of command recognized what Stoffer, and the Cuttyhunk, have already done.
Stoffer took over as commanding officer in July 2002.
From October 2001 to October 2004, the 110-foot Cuttyhunk has conducted 500 boardings, terminated the voyages of 15 vessels, completed 30 search and rescue cases, and performed about 100 escorts of Navy vessels, said Capt. Mark D’Andrea, commander of Coast Guard Group Port Angeles.
