What is the Canadian Coast Guard

The Canadian Coast Guard (CCG) is a national institution that provides maritime programs and services to Canadians. The Coast Guard fleet, Canada’s strong and visible presence, patrols the longest coastline and inland waterway, as well as the largest freshwater system of our planet.

From agile search and rescue lifeboats to icebreakers capable of breaking through two-metre-thick ice and six-metre-high ridges, our vessels are tasked to various programs and crewed by some 2,400 skilled seagoing personnel. The CCG operates a fleet of 116 vessels and 23 helicopters. On the ground, over 2,100 employees across Canada support our seagoing staff serving as the backbone of the agency.

The CCG has received funding in the past few years for 17 new vessels, 12 of which are to replace existing vessels and five that are additions to our fleet. The Coast Guard will need to hire some 100 additional seagoing and shore-based employees as a result.

Aids to Navigation

The CCG is tasked with ensuring the safe passage of marine traffic through Canada’s vast and challenging waterways and coastlines using a variety of aids to navigation. Some of the first ones that come to mind are the physical ones boaters can see, these include lighthouses and buoys, foghorns, as well as beacons and reflectors.

Long-range aids provide position information to vessels. Through technological advances, they have improved their accuracy in positioning from 400 metres with the LORAN C service implemented in the 1970s to within 10 metres with the more recent Differential Global Positioning System (DGPS).

The CCG is also working to implement the concept of e-Navigation, which will enhance the ability to share information electronically on a timely basis between ships. This will significantly enhance safety by making navigation easier for all!

Icebreaking

Frozen waters in May are as uniquely Canadian as the Icebreaking Program provided by the CCG. The Canadian Coast Guard responds to about 1,500 requests a year for icebreaking support. Working in partnership with Environment Canada’s Canadian Ice Service, the CCG allows safe and timely movement of maritime traffic in Canada’s ice-covered waters by:

• Freeing trapped vessels and escorting ships in ice
• Maintaining open tracks through ice firmly attached to the shore
• Re-supplying isolated northern settlements
• Providing ice information and ice routing information to assist vessels navigating through or around ice-covered waters
• Conducting harbour breakouts, and
• Reducing the risk of flooding on the St. Lawrence Seaway by monitoring, preventing and breaking up ice jams

Search and Rescue

Search and Rescue (SAR) personnel are always at the ready as disasters can occur any time, anywhere. The SAR Program involves searching for and assisting people, ships or other craft that are, or are believed to be, in imminent danger. The highly trained search and rescue coordinators and crews of the rescue centres are responsible for conducting the planning, coordination and control of search and rescue operations.

Our five rescue coordination centres have the ability to make use of any CCG vessel, including 41 dedicated search and rescue lifeboats stationed strategically throughout the country to provide the best possible response to SAR incidents, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. The Canadian Coast Guard Auxiliary, a volunteer organization consisting of about 4,300 members and 1,200 vessels, is a valuable support to the SAR Program.

Maritime Security

While the Canadian Coast Guard remains an unarmed organization, it assists in our national maritime security and sovereignty. The CCG offers vessels and shore-based infrastructure to organizations such as the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and the Canadian Forces, as well as providing surveillance through modern technology.

The CCG contributes to maritime security through the operation of the Automatic Identification System (AIS) and the development of the Long Range Identification and Tracking (LRIT) system. AIS involves the surveillance and identification of vessels approaching and operating within the Great Lakes and up to 40 nautical miles from Canada’s east and west coasts. The LRIT system will collect positional data on Canadian flag vessels, international vessels destined for Canadian ports, and vessels transiting within 1,000 nautical miles of Canada’s shores.

Environmental Response

It may be a messy job, but the CCG takes the lead in ensuring the cleanup of all ship-source and mystery spills into the marine environment in waters under Canadian jurisdiction and for supporting other countries under international agreement.

With experienced professionals, the CCG minimizes the environmental, economic and public safety impacts of marine pollution incidents by investigating reports of marine pollution in Canada. Working with commercial partners, we monitor and manage cleanup efforts. Our personnel are on standby 24 hours a day, seven days a week to investigate or initiate a response to pollution incident reports that are received regionally, nationally and internationally.

Marine Communications and Traffic Services

Marine Communications and Traffic Services (MCTS) are the eyes and ears of Canadian marine traffic. It is their duty to provide service to clients and stakeholders, such as the marine industry, recreational boaters, fishers, international government agencies, other federal government departments as well as provincial governments.

The MCTS Program contributes to the safety of life at sea and the protection of the marine environment. It is through the MCTS Program that search and rescue responders are notified of persons or vessels in distress.

Twenty-two MCTS centres, staffed by 340 qualified MCTS Officers, provide services across our five regions. Annually, the centres respond to more than 1,600 vessels with defective or deficient equipment. They also monitor in excess of 850,000 vessel movements, of which more than 23,000 are tankers.

Scientific Research

The CCG supports the Science Program of Fisheries and Oceans Canada by providing trained crewmembers on board both specialized and multitasked vessels such as research trawlers and hydrographic survey vessels.

The crew supports scientists and technicians in a variety of specialized areas, such as:

• Research fishing for a variety of commercial species
• Conducting surveys on acoustics, hydrography, geophysics, marine species stock assessment and benthic habitats and organisms
• Conducting marine mammal and seabird enumeration, identification, tracking and bioassessment
• Collecting plankton, larvae and phytoplankton, and
• Taking bottom sediment samples and coring

Waterways Management

The Waterways Management Program enables the CCG to help ensure safe and efficient navigation, supports protection of the marine environment and facilitates marine trade and commerce.

The core activities of the Program include:

• Providing channel design guidelines to help ensure that ship channel design, maintenance and usage is safe, efficient and environmentally sound
• Maintaining the international shipping channels in the Great Lakes system
• Managing the maintenance of the St. Lawrence ship channel
• Providing channel safety information to users, such as channel bottom conditions and water-depth forecasts
• Operating/maintaining channel marine structures, such as ice control structures, and
• Supporting the International Joint Commission in controlling levels and flows in the St. Lawrence River system

There are more than 100,000 transits in our waters each year, including some 36,000 domestic and commercial arrivals. Millions of recreational and touring boaters also use our commercial waterways each year, making this program vital to tourism.