The upgrade was entitled "Deepwater" and, like most large government procurements, turned into an absolute mess due to the collaboration between the government check-writers and the Integrated Deepwater Systems (IDS) Corporation that hired many of those government check-writers after they retired.
For one example of the debacle look at the 110 ft patrol boats. These small ships were made in the 80s/90s and were supposed to be "20 year hulls". Instead of decommissioning these ships, whose hulls were getting VERY thin, engineers figured they could cut them in half and add an extra 10 feet in the middle. EVERY sailor who had EVER sailed on those patrol boats knew it was a STUPID idea, but there are now very few sailors in Coast Guard management, so they went with the IDS concept. After three ships came out with the modification they realized that, even in a moderate sea state, they sprung leaks everywhere and the ships had to be decomissioned.
Of course, the taxpayer never got their money back.
Another example - while building the larger ships there were numerous short-cuts taken. For example, the communication wiring wasn't shielded enough, potentially allowing breach of top secret encryption. People tried blowing the whistle on IDS, but they were silenced. If you think we actually have "whistle blower protection" in America, you are wrong.
The bottom line is this: The Coast Guard used to be a great organization because it was led by operators. Now it's run by bureaucrats. Causes all kinds of problems, with Deepwater being just one of them.
