PORTSMOUTH, Va. – The crew of Coast Guard Cutter Legare returned home to Portsmouth Sunday after a 46 day deployment to the Caribbean Sea.
Their primary missions included the deterrence and interdiction of illegal migration and narcotics.
The crew and a creole interpreter intercepted a Haitian Sail Freighter with two men attempting to smuggle 240 migrants. They were returned to Haiti and the migrants disembarked safely on land, the two smugglers were arrested and the freighter was impounded by the Haitian Coast Guard.
They responded to another report of a migrant vessel spotted by a Coast Guard aircraft south of Turks and Caicos and interdicted the unseaworthy vessel with 146 Haitian migrants aboard. The crew transferred them to safety aboard the Legare in the process of repatriating them to Haiti. Petty Officer 1st Class David Meyer, the ship’s corpsman, worked around the clock administering emergency medical aid to a few severely dehydrated women.
This deployment was the last for Lt. Cmdr. Timothy O’Brien, who has served in the Coast Guard for more than thirty years. O’Brien enlisted in the Coast Guard Jan. 15, 1979, in Alameda, Calif., and has served aboard Legare three times. He commissioned the ship in 1989 as a petty officer, returned in 1996 to serve as Main Propulsion Assistant and again in 2006 for his final tour in the Coast Guard as the Engineer Officer. He resides in Newport News with his wife, Theresa, and their five children.
“His friendly personality, light hearted spirit and sense of humor has resounded through the passageways since Legare’s first days and will be greatly missed by the crew,” said Cmdr. Mike Cribbs, the ships executive officer.
