Topic: USCGC POLAR STAR

[oldcoastie6468]

Received from a fellow CG veteran.

, December 30, 2013 8:37 AM
Subject: Fw: POLAR STAR

STAR
 
Most recent data I could get.  She apparently went through "Reactivation" trials in July, and according to this was headed south.  Maybe hasn't arrived there as yet.  Doesn't appear to have a crew size like they used to have, and saw one item where they didn't have any "non-rates" aboard, so must be trying something new.
Jim


U.S. Coast Guard | Dec 04, 2013

SEATTLE – Coast Guard Cutter Polar Star departed Coast Guard Base Seattle for Antarctica, Tuesday, in support of Operation Deep Freeze for the first time since 2006 with the task of resupplying the National Science Foundation Scientific Research Station in McMurdo.

For more than 50 years, Coast Guard icebreaker crews have deployed to Antarctica in support of Operation Deep Freeze. They will assist by creating a navigable shipping lane through the layers of ice in McMurdo Sound. Approximately eight million gallons of U.S. fuel will be sent to McMurdo residents through the channel and be delivered to Winter Quarters Bay. This fuel allows the Station to remain manned and ready during the freezing winter months.

This past summer, CGC Polar Star conducted sea trials in the Arctic to test all of the ship’s equipment and train the crew prior to embarking to Antarctica this winter. During the summer trip, CGC Polar Star spent weeks in the Beaufort Sea north of Barrow, Alaska, testing propulsion machinery, conducting emergency drills, and qualifying crewmembers in individual watchstations.

In preparation for CGC Polar Star’s Deep Freeze Deployment, the crew overhauled many pieces of equipment from the bridge to the engine room and successfully completed a number of assessments to achieve their fully reactivated status.

Polar Star is a 399-foot Polar Class Icebreaker with a 140-person crew, homeported in Seattle. The cutter is recently out of a three-year, $90 million overhaul, which is part of the Coast Guard’s plan to reactivate the heavy icebreaker.

[Libertas]

I remember the USN policy on serving in hazardous areas, get above and beyond sea duty credit for certain postings...IIRC Antarctic duty qualified for the most...if you served one year your sea duty requirement was filled for each 4 year hitch.  I actually thought about it, but passed.  I'm from cold country, but that place is beyond cold...their summers are like my winters!

[oldcoastie6468]

I remember the USN policy on serving in hazardous areas, get above and beyond sea duty credit for certain postings...IIRC Antarctic duty qualified for the most...if you served one year your sea duty requirement was filled for each 4 year hitch.  I actually thought about it, but passed.  I'm from cold country, but that place is beyond cold...their summers are like my winters!

I don't believe there was any such program in the Coast Guard. Sea duty was sea duty, and most of the Coast Guard icebreaker duty was hazardous, even if it wasn't designated as such. Some guys I went to boot camp with were assigned to an icebreaker right out of boot camp, and they never saw any other kind of duty for their entire 4 year enlistment. From the CGC Northwind, to the CGC Mackinaw, to the CGC Westwind, all of them icebreakers. Most of the buoy tenders also broke ice when necessary.

[OldSailor]

US Coast Guard ice breaker to assist ships beset in ice in Antarctica
 
The Australian Maritime Safety Authority’s Rescue Coordination Centre (RCC Australia) has requested the US Coast Guard’s Polar Star icebreaker to assist the vessels MV Akademik Shokalskiy and Xue Long which are beset by ice in Commonwealth Bay.
 
The US Coast Guard has accepted this request and will make Polar Star available to assist.
 The Polar Star has been en route to Antarctica since 3 December, 2013 – weeks prior to the MV Akademik Shokalskiy being beset by ice in Commonwealth Bay. The intended mission of the Polar Star is to clear a navigable shipping channel in McMurdo Sound to the National Science Foundation’s Scientific Research Station. Resupply ships use the channel to bring food, fuel and other goods to the station. The Polar Star will go on to undertake its mission once the search and rescue incident is resolved.
 
RCC Australia identified the Polar Star as a vessel capable of assisting the beset vessels following MV Akademik Shokalskiy being beset by ice overnight on 24 December, 2013. RCC Australia has been in discussion with the US Coast Guard this week to ascertain if the Polar Star was able to assist once it reaches Antarctica.

More here:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/01/04/usa-to-the-rescue-us-coast-guard-ice-breaker-asked-to-assist-antarctic-rescue-vessels-trapped-in-ice-due-to-spiritofmawson-fiasco/

IIRC the only ships with greater clearing capability are Scandanavian (Finnish built) and Russian, all working the Arctic Ocean and Baltic routes.  Also, again IIRC the big Russian nuclear powered breakers have all been removed from service (some rumor of them being meltdowns waiting to happen.)  It would take months before any of them to make the trip from one end of the world to the other.

I don't recall where but I think I've seen one or the other of the "Polar" sisters, good sized and impressive ships.

God Speed Polar Star.

Polar Star at work -
World's Greatest Icebreaker

[AlanS]

 

[oldcoastie6468]

I heard tonight that the POLAR STAR is on its way to assist the other stuck ships in the Antarctic.

[Libertas]

They don't have to post watches out on weather decks do they?      

[Glock32]

A caller on Rush's show the other day said the hull design that makes these ships such good ice breakers also makes them very susceptible to roll when traversing open water.  He said even moderate seas were rather adventurous on an icebreaker.

[Pandora]

Heard that segment on Rush's show, too.

[rustybayonet]

A caller on Rush's show the other day said the hull design that makes these ships such good ice breakers also makes them very susceptible to roll when traversing open water.  He said even moderate seas were rather adventurous on an icebreaker.

They are, but they also are designing newer breakers that somewhat 'ride' better, with different bow and hull designs.
Back in the dark ages I tried to get stationed on the USCGC Eastwind [sorry CG you forgot about that one].  The Eastwind at the time was the only ship in the CG fleet carrying a dentist and technician, because it sail for 9-10 months per year to the Antarctic.  Its bow was the 'old' 'wind class' design and the Cutter Mackinaw 1 in the Great Lakes was the same class,[see below]

A diesel electric power plant delivers 10,000 h.p. through twin screws in the stern and one in the bow. The bow propeller is employed to suck the water beneath the ice allowing the Maierform bow to break the ice. When the Mackinaw drives its great bow onto the ice, the icebreaker is capable of breaking through 4 feet of solid sheet 'blue' ice. Mackinaw has also plowed through 37 ft. of 'windrow' (broken) ice.
Notice bow shape [sharp knife edge starts just above waterline.  It also could pump a thousand gallons of water port to starboard and reverse for addition blast and weight.
The 'Polar' class now has a flater rounded design for better ice crushing, below CGC Healy out of Alaska.  Healy is the newest of the Polar Class, it can sail at normal speeds through 4 1/2 - 5 feet of ice, and back and ram up to 43 foot of window ice.  Anything more and the crew can off load, drill and set charges to break-up the ice before the ship continues.



The newer ideas for design at 2012 prices make bigger and better breakers at a cost of $1 billion each.  Compare that to the Guards entire ship maintenance cost of $900 million for the whole fleet, it will undoubtedly be awhile before newer breakers are ordered for the Coast Guard.

Sorry for the long winded reply.

[Pandora]

Interesting stuff.  Requires no apology; always glad to learn something new.

[oldcoastie6468]

It is true that the older breakers rode like bath tubs in the seas.

[Libertas]

You would think there could be a rig of some sort they could carry amidships where they could extend catamaran-like hulls on each side to stabilize in normal seas, might allow them to kick the spurs a bit deeper.  I dunno, smarter brains than mine design these babies, I expect they doing just fine as is.  Probably need the deck space for other stuff I have no clue about.  Rescue gear and such I imagine.

[Glock32]

Yeah seems like I've heard of ships with bow planes that can be deployed for greater stability.  But I guess that might compromise the strength of the hull?  Your average ship isn't launching itself up onto the ice and using its sheer weight to break it.

[rustybayonet]

Bow planes would be ripped off from chunks of broken ice passing under the ship. The ships with 'bilbous bows' have them as stabilizers for speed and fuel efficiency but the waterline length is longer than about 15 metres (49 ft) and the vessel will operate most of the time at or near its maximum speed.  A bulbous bow also increases the buoyancy of the forward part, but riding on the ice for crushing ability is out of the question with this type bow.  One design being looked at is '<' kind of a cutting edge to slice the ice from the bottom of the ice.

[Septugenarian]

I'm kind of impressed with Finland's icebreaker technology.

[rustybayonet]

I'm kind of impressed with Finland's icebreaker technology.

Agreed

[Libertas]

I like the one with a gun!

 

http://www.polartrec.com/expeditions/prehistoric-human-response-to-climate-change/journals/2009-05-23-1

[rustybayonet]

I like the one with a gun!

 

http://www.polartrec.com/expeditions/prehistoric-human-response-to-climate-change/journals/2009-05-23-1

The Finland icebreaker with the bow gun is similar to the design of our earlier 'wind' class, circa World War II.  Eastwind, Northwind, Westwind, Southwind all armed during WWII;
WAG 279-282:

4 × 5 in (130 mm)/38 cal deck guns
12 × 40 mm/60 cal anti-aircraft guns
6 × 20 mm/80 cal anti-aircraft guns
2 × depth charge racks
Y-gun projectors
1 × Hedgehog anti-submarine mortar

Quick history event.
The Eastwind WAGB279 [Hull number] along with USCGC Northwind crews and Army troops they transported captured a German garrison on Greenland that had been monitoring weather in the north Atlantic for German submarine operartions against the convoys to Europe.

[OldSailor]

I'm kind of impressed with Finland's icebreaker technology.

Wärtsilä of Finland has been building some of the most capable icebreakers around and is supplying powerplants to the Russians for a pair of icebreakers being built in the Vyborg Shipyard under project 21900M as well as (IIRC) entire ships in the past.