Port Captain Introductions: Mike Powers

     Mike Powers has been appointed Port Captain for an additional harbor; Monroe, Mich. (E-23). His homeport is located at Bolles Harbor, Mich. (E-22), where he and his wife Kathy have served as GLCC Port Captains since 2012. They have been members of the Monroe Boat Club since 2008 where Mike has served as Power Fleet Captain, Financial Secretary, Rear Commodore, Vice Commodore, Commodore and Past Commodore. He previously served the I-LYA as Trustee in 2015 and as Powerboat Chair in 2016 and was honored by being named Mid-America Boating’s Skipper of the Year in 2016.

     Mike started in small sailboats with his father at Kiser Lake Sailing Club, north of Dayton, Ohio. He continued sailboat racing while attending the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, sailing a variety of boats ranging from 12-foot cat rigged dinghies to a 73-foot offshore racing ketch. Mike also sailed on the USCGC Eagle, the 295-foot barque while at the Academy.

     During his career with the U.S. Coast Guard, Mike served on three icebreakers on the Great Lakes, including the USCGC Macinaw, Cheboygan, Mich.; the USCGC Mobile Bay, Sturgeon Bay, Wis.; and as Commanding Officer of USCGC Neah Bay, in Cleveland, Ohio. His last shipboard tour was on USCGC Polar Sea, Seattle, Wash. While aboard Polar Sea in 1994, the ship became the first United States surface ship to reach the North Pole and, in company with the Canadian CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent, they were the first surface ships to cross the Arctic Ocean. Mike worked in communications, information systems, and electronics support while ashore. He retired in 1998.

     Following his Coast Guard career, Mike was an Electronics Engineering Technology instructor and Dean with ITT Technical Institute and an Assistant Professor and Electrical Engineering Technology Department Chair at Michigan Technological University, Houghton, Mich. He retired from teaching in 2013.

     Mike has helped in the GLCC booth at the Cleveland Boat Show. He and Kathy can often be found either sailing aboard their J/24, Mariner, or cruising around western Lake Erie aboard their boat Voyageur. He would like to invite GLCC members to visit Monroe. It is an excellent stopping point en route to locations in western Lake Erie!