Sitka man to be paid $419,840 to put boats under Coast Guard helicopters

Benjamin Lawrie of Sitka will be paid $419,840 over the next year to put boats under Coast Guard helicopters while crews practice lifting people off the water. The order was signed Aug. 27 and starts Tuesday.

It draws on a five-year agreement the Coast Guard set up with him in March, worth up to $1.64 million through 2031. The work runs from Sept. 1 through the end of August 2027, and when the Coast Guard set the job aside for small businesses, only one company bid.

The training it supports is a hoist: a helicopter holds a hover while a rescue swimmer or basket goes down a cable to a boat or into the water. Practicing it takes a surface platform, which is what Lawrie supplies — the vessel, the crew, the fuel, and the running of the boat while the aircraft works overhead.

The Coast Guard runs the same arrangement at stations around the country. It is paying B & B's Aloha LLC $301,440 over ten months, and paid Management Marine Service $546,800 for a year of the work at Atlantic City. The award record does not describe Lawrie's boats. Air Station Sitka flies MH-60 Jayhawks.