 Attached to the 3rd Naval District, she laid cable off Cape May, New Jersey, and off Bermuda before conducting ocean bottom surveys and cable operations off Colombia's Atlantic and Pacific coasts, 13 October to 31 October.Returning to New York, "Portunus" underwent overhaul and on 8 March 1954 resumed cable operations, first in the approaches to New York, off Sandy Hook, New Jersey, then off Bermuda.From 1955 to 1959 she continued to lay cable, off Key West, off Sandy Hook, off Bermuda, off Wood Island, Maine, off Nantucket Island, in the Narragansett area, and off Little Creek, Virginia.