The 225-foot Juniper-class seagoing buoy tender USCGC Hickory (WLB 212) has arrived in Guam, completing a more than 13,000-nautical-mile, 71-day transit from the U.S. Coast Guard yard in Baltimore via the Panama Canal. 

Following an extensive major maintenance availability, the cutter is fully revitalized with hull repairs, system upgrades, and modernized equipment—ensuring reliability and mission readiness for its full 30-year service life.

Hickory’s arrival restores the full complement of three seagoing buoy tenders supporting the vast Pacific, strengthening maritime safety across oceania. Homeported in Guam, the cutter specializes in maintaining aids to navigation that mark hazards and support safe passage through strategic sea lanes vital to military operations and commercial shipping.

The cutter’s area of responsibility includes 143 aids to navigation, with 90 federally maintained. En route to Guam, Hickory conducted joint buoy assessments in Majuro with the Marshall Islands Ports Authority to support future maintenance and upgrades.

With its specialized crane and capabilities, Hickory is now positioned to repair outstanding federal aids around Guam and Saipan, while also supporting search and rescue, maritime law enforcement, marine environmental protection, and homeland security missions across the region.