Nation’s only heavy icebreaker departs for Antarctic military operation

Hate it when the word "military" is used out of context. It's a support operation as "military" activities are prohibited by treaty in Antarctica. I was down on the ice in the '76-'79 timeframe when the ship (we had a different name for it) made its first trip there. Lots of breakdowns. We had our shops busy fabricating custom parts. A critical design flaw (understrength shaft mounts) limited the ship to 50% power. The Polar Sea was under construction so that didn't go beyond the one vessel. A trip to the drydock for modifications took the Star out of service for a while. Because she couldn't apply full power, the ship got hung up on 8 foot ice. I freed it up using explosives. We had the Glacier, Northwind, and Burton Island doing the work most of the time. There's a lot of confusion out there on the differences between a heavy and medium icebreaker. It isn't the thickest ice it can go through, it's the thickness that can be overcome in steady forward motion. A medium should go through 4-5 feet at around 3 knots. A heavy should go through 6-7 feet at that speed. We'd get up to 14 feet of ice for which the breakers would have to ram, back up, ram, etc. That's very tedious. More tedious as you have to wait for the propellers to mill all that extra ice.

Great post!

Thank you, my friend PO1 Kevin Dougherty for making us aware that the USS Polar Star "heavy icebreaker' is sailing southward to Antarctica to support a military operation.