Ship Photos: U.S. Icebreaker 'Polar Star' Reaches McMurdo Station, Antarctica – gCaptain

Actually not that big, about 4oo' and not quite 11,000 tons. Lots of power with 6 3000 HP diesels, and 3 25,000 HP turbines. they can run on or the other or both as needed to provide power to the three props. She can do about 3.5MPH in 6 feet of ice.

There is a reason why they are nicknamed the Polar Rollers .... on the other hand it would be a heck of an adventure ... Never made it south, but spent a year 500 miles North of the Arctic Circle on LORAN duty. Winter was well ... challenging ...

PO1 Kevin Dougherty - On the way back out, we caught a 45 (some said 50) degree roll in the middle of the night. Though, night there, below the Antarctic Circle in the summer, wasn't night by full-on day. Woke lots of people up! On the water, it's a roller coaster; on the ice, it's an earthquake. I took video of my uniform on a hanger swinging out 35 degrees from the wall about 10 times in 15 seconds...except that it wasn't my uniform moving, but the ship on the waves!

I can relate both to the "night" and the ride. I spent a year at Cape Christian, 500 miles North of the Arctic Circle. Most of us had the windows in our rooms blacked out with cardboard so we could sleep at night ... whatever shift we happened to be sleeping. Winter was challenging in the same way ... either season, between watches and no day/night, everyone's clocks got screwed up.

I also spent a year on a 210 out of Newcastle NH. Walked on the bulkheads more than a few times ... One of my most memorable memories was waking in the middle of the night to the HM-1 yelling ... I opened my eyes to see him midair in the little lounge area we had in 1st class berthing. He somehow landed in a chair and sat there cursing while we all laughed our asses off.