USS COLE TO HEADLINE MARITIME HERITAGE FESTIVAL IN NEW LONDON

New London — The USS Cole, the guided-missile destroyer attacked by suicide bombers during a 2000 refueling stop in Yemen, and the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Thunder Bay are among the ships scheduled to visit the city next month during the Connecticut Maritime Heritage Festival.

The event will take place Sept. 8-10.

Two other Coast Guard vessels — the cutter Albacore, an 87-foot coastal patrol boat homeported in New London, and the Bollard, a 65-foot tug based in New Haven — also will take part, along with security patrol craft from the Submarine Base, festival organizers announced this week.

In a first for the event, the Coast Guard will stage a search-and-rescue demonstration on the Thames River at 1 p.m. Sept. 9. An MH-60-T Jayhawk helicopter will participate in the exercise in full view of festival-goers at Waterfront Park.

John Johnson, the festival chairman, said the military vessels will be joined by a number of other ships and that the festival will again feature the Great New London Chowder Challenge, dockside maritime educational displays and an off-shore race among schooners, including the defending champion, Columbia out of Panama City, Fla. As part of the festival, the Oliver Hazard Perry, a tall ship homeported in Newport, R.I., will take students from New London, Groton and Ledyard on a fiveday sail-training cruise to Newport.

The USS Cole was severely damaged in the 2000 attack in which 17 of its crew were killed and another 39 injured. The terrorist organization al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attack.

The Cole and the Thunder Bay will be berthed at Fort Trumbull State Park, where they will be open for tours, as will the other Coast Guard vessels that will dock along the New London waterfront. Festival attendees will be able to take advantage of the water taxis, which make stops at City Pier, Fort Trumbull and Fort Griswold.