National and Homeland Security

Protecting more than 95,000 miles of national shoreline

The United States has more than 95,000 miles of national shoreline including borders in the Pacific, Atlantic and Gulf Coasts as well as the Great Lakes separating the United States from Canada. Along this shoreline are many of America’s greatest cities and in virtually all of these locations there are ports through which millions of cargo containers and hundreds of thousands of passengers annually pass.

Additionally, the United States is a nation of rivers, with the inland waterways of the country encompassing more than 25,000 miles of navigable waters.

The U.S. marine transportation system

The U.S. marine transportation system encompasses all of these waterways, as well as the world’s largest exclusive economic zone. For regulatory, safety and security purposes, it includes 361 ports, over 3,000 facilities and more than 14,000 regulated domestic vessels.

U.S. Sealift Capacity

America’s domestic fleet is an important part of the national maritime infrastructure that helps ensure ample U.S. sealift capacity is available to defend and supply our cities. American ships, along with the crews to operate them, transport construction and repair yards, intermodal equipment, terminals, cargo tracking systems and other important infrastructure can be made available to the U.S. military at a moment’s notice in times of war, national emergency, or even in peacetime.