¹⁄700

USCG Bear, JAG Collective

"The United States Coast Guard medium endurance cutter, USCG Bear, is the focus of this MSW "On Display" built by Dade Bell!"



Commissioned on February 4, 1983, the USCG Bear is a United States Coast Guard medium endurance cutter. Notable aspects of her career were searching 1900 square nautical miles after the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster and making 18 significant drug seizures. She is still in service.

This model is the excellent JAG Collective 1/700 kit. JAG is easily one of the best resin ship makers in the world and this kit went together like a dream. The level of detail is precise and tight.

I wanted to build this kit as a break from all of the usual gray and blue ships in my collection and as a sort of memorial to my late mother who received her Coast Guard certification less than a year before her untimely passing.

There is hardly any weathering visible on this model because the real ships are virtually spotless and always "pop" visually. Ironically, the real ships look almost "toy like" from medium distances thanks to their striking white color schemes.

The photo etch is from the model's included fret, with a couple extra rails from Tom's Model Works. The six vertical antennae are cut from whiskers my cats shed. They make the best antenna as they spring back to shape and are very hard to snap off as with wire or sprue.

Instead of mounting the model on my usual water base, I put it on a smooth light blue surface to better profile the clean lines and colors of the Bear. The HH-60 Jayhawk provides an extra splash of color.

This build depicts the Bear in her 1980's fit.