The Coast Guard Cutter Juniper held a change of command ceremony last Thursday. Cmdr. A. Brian Caudle, left, was relieved by Lt. Cmdr. John M. Singletary, a Laurinburg native, with Rear Adm. Linda L. Fagan, commander of the 1st Coast Guard District, presiding over the ceremony.

The 225-foot Coast Guard Cutter Juniper, a buoy tender homeported in Newport, R.I., shown at anchor in Pond Inlet, in the Arctic.

BOSTON — The Coast Guard Cutter Juniper held a change of command ceremony Thursday in Newport, Rhode Island.

Lt. Cmdr. John M. Singletary, a native of Laurinburg, relieved Cmdr. A. Brian Caudle as the commanding officer of Coast Guard Cutter Juniper during a traditional, time-honored military ceremony.

Coast Guard Cutter Juniper is a 225-foot Seagoing Buoy Tender home-ported in Newport. While under the command of Caudle, the Juniper crew safely transited over 16,000 nautical miles, accumulated 5,700 underway hours and serviced more than 200 buoys from Maine to New Jersey. The crew participated in Op Nanook 2012, a five-phase Arctic deployment.

The primary mission of Cutter Juniper’s crew is to service short and long range aids to navigation. They are also capable of handling and assisting a variety of other missions such as maritime law enforcement, homeland security, ice breaking, environmental pollution response, and search and rescue.