Zephyr breezes into harbor

Alex Coolman

As fireboats squirted cheerful jets of water into the air and the

Newport Harbor High band tooted through a rendition of “Anchors Aweigh,”

the U.S. Navy coastal patrol vessel Zephyr cruised slowly into Newport

Harbor on Friday.

The 179-foot Cyclone class patrol boat, used by the Navy in connection

with its SEAL operations, will stay in town this weekend before motoring

back to her home port in Coronado.

In lieu of a more formal dock, the Zephyr is tied to the Pride of

Newport, the paddle wheel boat that houses the Newport Nautical Museum.

It sounded like a fine idea, but the execution proved a little tricky

as sailors worked to moor the massive gray boat.

No sooner had they wrapped a line from the Zephyr around a cleat on

the Pride of Newport’s deck than the Navy vessel shifted slightly. The

line went taut and the heavy metal cleat popped off the boat like a

button from a shirt.

Getting the boat safely into Newport Harbor, with its infamously

shallow bottom, was also a concern, said Wayne Eggleston, director of the

Newport Nautical Museum.

The museum scooped a little muck off the bottom of the harbor early

this week in anticipation of the arrival of the Zephyr, which has a draft

of about 8 feet.

But Eggleston said the bottom quickly filled up again with silt.

“We had to have an extension,” he said, referring to a roughly

10-foot-wide platform that was attached to the dock on the harbor side of

the Pride of Newport to make sure the Zephyr didn’t run aground.

“We thought, ‘Oh God, you know, what are we going to do?’ ” if the

harbor proves too shallow, he said.

Rubbing elbows with museum officials at dockside Friday was Newport

Beach Mayor John Noyes, who had stopped by to welcome the sailors.

“It’s great that the Nautical Museum is promoting this and supporting

Newport Beach’s heritage,” Noyes said.

The Zephyr will available for free tours from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. today

and Sunday. The boat leaves Monday at 8 a.m.

The Pride of Newport, where the Zephyr is docked, is at 151 East Coast

Highway, Newport Beach. For more information, call (949) 673-7863.