Netherlands Coastguard


The Netherlands Coastguard is the coastal defence and maritime law enforcement branch of the Royal Netherlands Navy patrolling the Dutch coastline.
Its operational command falls under the Ministry of Defence and the Royal Netherlands Navy is responsible for its coordination.

History

While the Netherlands Coastguard was officially established on 26 February 1987, this does not mean there was no coastguard active in the Netherlands before 1987. Since 1883 there has been a coastguard active in the Netherlands in some sort of an unofficial capacity. In that year the Dutch government published a report named 'het houden van een uitkijk en het rapporteren van in nood verkerende schepen aan Hoofden Kustwacht'. The report was a reaction to the public outcry over an incident that had taken place in 1882, when the Dutch ship, HNLMS Adder, sunk off-coast at Scheveningen and led to the death of all 65 people aboard. The report led to lighthouses cooperating better with the relevant government agencies to help ships that were in trouble off-coast.
After World War II the area that could be covered off-coast became bigger with new technologies such as radars and better means of communication. Furthermore, the government became more interested in the North Sea. They wanted to protect their interests, such as fishery, oil and gas extraction, and sand and gravel extraction. Eventually, this led to each ministry establishing its own department that was focused on the North Sea and guarding the coast of the Netherlands. At one point there were more than twenty government organisations at work off the coast of the Netherlands. To stop this fragmentation, Minister Smit-Kroes of Traffic and water management ordered in 1984 an investigation to research how to make guarding the coast of the Netherlands more efficient and effective. The results of this report were published in 1986 and led to the official creation of one coastguard agency, namely the Netherlands Coastguard.

Organisation

The Netherlands Coastguard carries out duties for six government ministries, these ministries are the:
The Coastguard tasks can be divided into Provision of service tasks and Law enforcement tasks.

Vessels

The Coast Guard has no vessels of its own, so resources are made available by the cooperating ministries and services
VesselOriginTypeNotes
P42Netherlandspatrol boatprovided by the National Police Corps
OspreyNetherlandspatrol boatprovided by the National shipping company
Bald EagleNetherlandspatrol boat
Barend BiesheuvelNetherlandspatrol boatprovided by the National shipping company
HellholeNetherlandslifeboatprovided by the Theunisse Salvage
KBW1910Netherlandslifeboatprovided by the Dutch Sea Rescue Institution
George DijkstraNetherlandslifeboat
Jeanine ParquiNetherlandslifeboat
Koen ObermanNetherlandslifeboat
Jan van EngelenburgNetherlandslifeboat
Fury 3Netherlandsanchor tugprovided by the Theunisse Salvage
Fury 4Netherlandsanchor tug
GuardianNetherlandsanchor tugprovided by the National shipping company
FlystreamNetherlandsbuoy maintainer
Barge holeNetherlandsbuoy maintainer
New DeepNetherlandsbuoy maintainer
TerschellingNetherlandsbuoy maintainer
Wadden SeaNetherlandsbuoy maintainer
Frans NaereboutNetherlandsbuoy maintainer
ZirfeaNetherlandsresearch vesselprovided by the National shipping company
ArcaNetherlandsmultifunctional vesselprovided by the National shipping company
Zr.Ms. WillemstadNetherlandsmine sweeperprovided by the Royal Netherlands Navy

Footnotes