Coast Guard et al

A few mornings ago, I was headed to the Ohio River for a quick look at things before I headed to work. On the boulevard in Huntington WV along the river -- the one where you can't see the river for the floodwall -- I found myself behind this truck and trailer. They used the same entrance to Harris Riverfront Park that I did.

I might have been on this boat many years ago when I was a reporter for the Huntington paper. The Coast Guard wanted to show me what they were doing on the river in terms of homeland security after 9/11. They didn't show me everything, of course, but they wanted the public to know they were out there.

But as I looked at this boat I got to thinking that earlier this year I saw a Huntington police department boat that was something like this one, and the Huntington Fire Department announced a few weeks ago that it is getting $500,000 from the Department of Homeland Security to buy a boat of similar size.

I guess if anything happens on the river at or near Huntington, someone can get a boat in the water fairly quickly. That's the idea, at least.