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The former Army officer who served with the 101st Airborne in Vietnam is recruiting volunteers to help the Coast Guard Auxiliary keep Tampa Bay safe.
“After 9/11, I wanted to do something to help my country,” he said. “I’d become very boat oriented over the past few years, so this was a perfect choice.”
Owning a boat, he emphasizes, is not a criteria for membership in the CGA. “What we really need most are trained crew members,” he says. “At the moment, our flotilla has five members with vessels, but only two or three qualified crew members.”
And while the auxiliary tends toward military men, women are more than welcome and no military experience is necessary. “We’re a very inclusive group with a lot of camaraderie,” he adds.
Membership is open to any U.S. citizen over the age of 17, although some programs require stringent background checks. “It’s very much like what I went through in the Army to get a top-secret cryptograph,” Fogle said. Depending upon responsibilities, volunteers also are expected to complete specific training programs.
“Even though I had a USCG Master Captain’s license with a towing endorsement for a 100-ton boat, the Coast Guard has their own way of doing things and they train you do things their way.” Most of the classes are handson and on the water, with topics like boarding other boats and towing them, he adds.
CGA volunteers have a wide variety of responsibilities, from teaching boater safety programs and voluntary boat inspections to classified missions that assist the Coast Guard in monitoring security zones. Nationally, CGA members saved 257 lives, and spent more than 440,000 hours supporting Coast Guard operations and nearly 70,000 hours educating recreational boaters.
For most Tampa Bay boaters, CGA volunteers are most visible teaching the programs necessary for boaters under 21 to obtain a license. “We get people from all walks of life, and we try to teach them the practical aspects of boating as well as the academic,” he says.
“One of the really scary things about boating in Florida is that any adult with a big enough checkbook can put a boat on the water with absolutely no training,” he adds. “We’ve all had a lot of experience on the water and we try to tell memorable stories so people won’t do things like put a boat in the water without checking the plugs first.”
The Coast Guard Auxiliary has nearly a dozen flotillas in the Tampa Bay region, including Fogle’s in south St. Petersburg. For more information, visit http://www.cgaux7.org/pub_map.asp or call 877-875-6296.
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