LT Ainsley Fruhwirth is from Exton, PA and is a 2018 graduate of the U.S. Coast Guard Academy. Upon graduation, her first assignment was serving as the Operations Officer and Boarding officer aboard the Fast Response Cutter CGC Heriberto Hernandez (WPC 1114) homeported in San Juan, Puerto Rico. There she completed a variety of Coast Guard missions including Search and Rescue, Migrant Interdiction, and Counter-Drug. The cutter’s law enforcement actions resulted in the repatriation of 500 migrants and the confiscation of 850kg of illicit narcotics. In 2020, she reported aboard the Coast Guard’s largest ship, CGC Healy (WAGB 20), homeported in Seattle, WA as the Assistant Operations Officer and Navigator. She was responsible for the planning and execution of the cutter’s first Northwest Passage and Panama Canal transit since 2005. This 133-day deployment, circumnavigating North America, included a historic joint Search and Rescue exercise with the Canadian Coast Guard in the Canadian Arctic, where the Commandant of the Coast Guard and the Commissioner of the Canadian Coast Guard sailed aboard Healy, exercising their forces in a dynamic and rapidly changing hemisphere. In 2022 she took command of the CGC Benjamin Dailey/Jacob Poroo ALT, homeported in Pascagoula, MS. She implemented and executed the Coast Guard’s first dual-crew initiative aboard a Fast Response Cutter. LT Fruhwirth conducted Living Marine Resource enforcement and Non-Compliant Vessel pursuits in the Gulf of Mexico, along the U.S./Mexico Maritime Boundary Line. Her crew interdicted 12 illegal Mexican fishing vessels in U.S. waters, confiscating over 3,500 pounds of illicit catch, and successfully combating Illegal, Unregulated, and Unreported fishing. LT Fruhwirth graduated from the University of Rhode Island in 2026 with her M.S.. She lives in Richmond, RI with her husband, Jordan, four cats, and 6 chickens.

Education

• M.S., Oceanography, University of Rhode Island, 2026
• B.S., Marine and Environmental Science, U.S. Coast Guard Academy, 2018

Courses Taught

• Data Exploration and Visualization
• Oceans 1: Air and Sea (Lab)

Selected Publications and Presentations

• Thesis: Data improved models applied to essential oceanographic processes in Rhode Island coastal waters, University of Rhode Island. 

Honors and Awards

• National Honor Society Induction – University of California, San Diego Chapter

Professional Affiliations

• The Oceanography Society
• American Geophysical Union