White Alder

White Alder was stationed at New Orleans, Louisiana throughout her Coast Guard career, which spanned 1947 until 1968. Her primary assignment was to tend river aids-to-navigation although she was called upon to conduct other traditional Coast Guard duties, such as search and rescue or law enforcement duties, as required. At approximately 18:29 Central Standard Time on 7 December 1968, the "down-bound" White Alder collided with the "up-bound" M/V Helena, a 455-foot (139) Taiwanese freighter in the Mississippi River at mile 195.3 above Head of Passes near White Castle, Louisiana and sank in 75 feet of water. Three of the crew of 20 were rescued, while the other 17 perished. Divers recovered the bodies of three of the dead but river sediment buried the cutter so quickly that continued recovery and salvage operations proved impractical. The Coast Guard decided to leave the remaining 14 crewmen entombed in the sunken cutter, which remains buried in the bottom of the Mississippi River. The Coast Guard dedicated a memorial, at the Coast Guard base in New Orleans, to the White Alder and her crew on 7 December 1969. The memorial was moved to the new Coast Guard Group New Orleans offices in Metairie, Louisiana, and rededicated on 6 December 2002.