About time.
The U.S. Coast Guard’s heavy icebreaker USCGC Polar Star has returned to its home port of Seattle, Washington, after a major service life-extending overhaul – and not a moment too soon. The medium icebreaker USCGC Healy, the service’s only other icebreaker available for operations in the Arctic and Antarctica, also sailed back into Seattle earlier this month after suffering a fire that forced its crew to abandon a planned deployment to the High North.
While Polar Star continues to be the world's most powerful non-nuclear icebreaker, it is also the only on in service capable of operating year round in Arctic and Antarctic waters.
Heavy icebreakers like Polar Star are “defined as ships that have icebreaking capability of 6 feet of ice continuously at 3 knots, and can back and ram through at least 20 feet of ice,” according to a report from the National Research Council of the National Academies. The medium icebreaker “Healy is designed to break 4.5 feet of ice continuously at three knots.
Elect me president and I'll have them build four more - the biggest they can. We're the biggest economy in the world by far. There's no reason there shouldn't be money for this.
My website is "Elect CW President (joking here)"
Starting the countdown until this 48 year old ship has another major propulsion failure.
ReplyDeleteA new icebreaker?
ReplyDeleteWhy?
With glow bull worming coming up we no longer need it.
CORRECTION: "Man Caused Global Warming" - you've got to get it right or the libtards will discount your wisdom.
ReplyDeleteI read somewhere that before WW2, they were going to build icebreakers for use on the Great Lakes.
ReplyDeleteThey purposely built them larger than the locks could handle, to keep the US Navy from "requisitioning" them.
Sure enough, during the war, here comes the Navy, saying "We'll take those, thank you very much.". The Navy was told "If you can get them out of here, you can have them.".
Those icebreakers stayed in the Great Lakes.
Russia has 40 including 4 nuclear and China has 4 . They own the Ice cap.
ReplyDeleteActually, Russia has bigger, better...but nuke driven. They are the biggest economy.
ReplyDelete"They are the biggest economy"
DeleteCare to explain based on what metric is it that you believe that Russia has the bigger economy?
Our total GDP is 15-18 times larger. Our per capita GDP is 6 times larger. We produce more of everything, including oil, than Russia.
The only thing that the Russian economy has more than the US is oligarchs, but some people are very diligently working to make sure we have just as many if not more oligarchs here.
I know you hate the US. But don't lie to yourself and look at the real world.
joe says no deal.....
ReplyDeleteActually, on a PPP basis the US has the third largest economy in the world, after China, and India. Russia is number 4. The US has negligible commercial ship-building capacity; China's is 700 times as large as ours. The Chinese make 75% of all the commercial shipping in the world each year (tonnage basis). Even Russia's ship-building capacity which is a distant 4th or 5th behind China, South Korea, and Japan, is very much larger than ours.
ReplyDeleteSome US admiral suggested we buy our warships from South Korea. Maybe we can get our icebreakers from Russia.
Russia would sell us ice breakers, AFTER we came to our senses and stopped trying to overthrow them.
DeleteThe HATE that some Americans have for America is staggering!
DeleteThe year is 2024 not 1954. Get your heads out of your asses.
There is an argument to be made around the national security implications of having limited shipbuilding capability... There is also an argument to be made around the need for a Navy as large as ours in 2024.
China's shipbuilding capacity is 200 times larger than the US'. 200 times larger is significantly larger. No need to lie and make it 700 times larger.
China's shipbuilding industry is SUBSIDIZED by the GOVERNMENT and 100% CONTROLED by the government. Is that what you want? Do you want your tax dollars going to subsidize the cost of commercial ships for private companies so that we have capacity available in case some day, maybe we may need it? How much capacity is enough capacity?
The US had a large shipbuilding capacity until the 80's. Our shipbuilding capacity was ALSO subsidized by the government. Reagan and the end of the cold war lead to the end of those subsidies.
Ship building is a dirty, low wage industry. Most Americans don't want to do that job. Americans are free to decided to take jobs that pay better and are less dangerous. Most Americans want to live a happy life with their families. It is hard to live a happy life if you are forced into a job you don't want that pays low wages and has the potential to kill you on a daily basis.
Chinese workers don't have the FREEDOM to choose what job to take or not. In many cases they don't have the FREEDOM to move to a better paying job. To a large extent Chinese kids are raised by grandparents because parents are working 1345 hours a week just to be able to feed their families.
I thought you were for freedom, free economy and the pursuit of happiness! Are you arguing that some Americans should do this dirty, low paying job?
By the way. We have allies. Allies are important in case of war because they can help us in case of need. When people argue for scrapping NATO they are arguing for making us weaker in the global stage. If WW3 that many fantasize were to happen there is no scenario that would not include us. If WW3 comes and we had scrapped NATO, where do you suggest we could repair our ships that were damaged far from our ports. Would Korea, Japan, Australia, Germany, etc. open their ports to aid our sailors once we turned our backs on them?
Make up your minds people!
If we will scrap NATO, turn our backs on our allies, retreat to our shores, build walls and hunker down in the homeland... Then there is no NEED for a Navy. Bulk up the Coastguard and we are good to go. No need for icebreakers, aircraft carriers and submarines. Who gives a shit about shipbuilding capacity if we will turn our backs on the world.
Some people are too stupid to be able to see the big picture...
Now you're making sense! Scrap NATO and the UN! Turn our backs on the rest of the world (that hates us anyway)! Retreat to our own shores! Build a wall and most importantly stop being the "Policeman of the World"!!! The compulsive and inexperienced idiots running this once-great nation have lost sight of "America First!"
DeleteJohn August 30, 2024 at 8:52 AM. Doesn't get it. Nato, UN, etc are all there to prevent WW3, in case WW3 were to happen those organization would benefit us and finally the UN, Nato, etc put us at the center of the world order. Those organizations ENSURE that we are the dominant super power in the world.
DeleteWe don't have to be the dominant super power. We can choose to turn our backs on the world, build walls and hunker down. But then several things can happen.
Worst case scenario WW3 erupts. There is no scenario in which we would be "let out" of WW3. Our military just by existing would be a threat to any party involved in a global conflict. Sooner or later one of the parties would launch a "preventive" strike against us. Unless you are arguing for scraping our military so that we not perceived as a threat there is no way WW3 can happen without us being involved in some way.
Best case scenario: We hunker down and WW3 doesn't happen. The world will continue to grow and become more and more connected but we will just sit on a side and not be part of that growth. Alliances and partnerships will be forged among the countries are connected while we sit on the sidelines. Eventually some other country (pick your poison) will overtake us as the dominant super power.
It is ok if we want to let someone else drive the world while we look but that also has consequences. We are the biggest, most powerful country in the world BECAUSE we are the only super power. The power we have comes from our alliances (commercial and military). Our economic power comes from our dominance. We are rich because we are strong. No empire ever has lost it might and kept its wealth and we will not be different.
Rome, Cairo, Athens or Istanbul are nowhere nearly are rich as they were when they dominated large parts of the world.
We can turn our backs on the world, build walls and hunker down but then we will either be drawn into a global war that we may not survive or be much poorer and have a lower standard of living than we have.
I choose neither. Being conservative means among other things to conserve what we have. That is exactly what I want.
I re-piped the pony boiler on that thing back in the early 90s. Nice boat.
ReplyDeleteTake away 90% of the DEI budget for the Navy and the Air Farce, and give it all instead to the Coasties for ships and maintenance, and whom will actually do something worthwhile with the funds.
ReplyDeleteEnjoyed some time on uscg river tugs converted into ice breaks. Cool stuff.
ReplyDelete