The crews from the U.S. Coast Guard's Airstation Sacramento are known for going the distance, and doing it 24/7.
The ill-fated mission off the coast of San Diego on Thursday night was the third search-and-rescue mission over the Pacific in three days for crews from the Sacramento station.
A Sacramento-based crew of seven is missing after reportedly colliding with a Marine helicopter during a mission off the San Diego coast. That crew had been searching for a man reported missing while attempting to row a dinghy to Catalina Island.
Already this week, crews flying Sacramento's mammoth C-130 Hercules aircraft had flown cover for a medi-vac rescue from a ship off the coast of Mexico and had provided air support for the rescue of five people from a sinking sailboat off the coast of Mexico.
The Sacramento station recently had run a half-dozen relief missions delivering materials between Hawaii and Samoa after a tsunami hit in the South Pacific, officials here said.
"We go anywhere required," Sacramento spokesman Lt. Commander Sean Green said, from the Canadian border to the Galapagos Islands. The Coast Guard motto is Semper Paratus - Always Ready.
The local unit, at the former McClellan Air Force base in North Highlands, employs about 200 people.
"The Coast Guard is a small branch that is very close knit," Petty Officer Alan Haraf said this morning. "We are a family. There is a lot of concern for the families and the crew stationed here."
The station's C-130 fuel capacity allows the crews to go long distances and conducted extended searches or emergency operations at sea.
Call The Bee's Tony Bizjak, (916) 321-1059.
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