Maybe icebreakers will be the vanguard into a new era of US shipbuilding? This article from gCaptain & a DC think tank floats the idea. They also project the possible need for MORE than 40, the number the potus shot out a couple months ago.
I heard you want some icebreakers…
Considering the Finns expertise at building icebreakers I’m glad they are playing on the same team. I searched but couldn’t find the results for the Men’s Members-Guest Golf Tournament at Trump International Golf Club in Palm Beach County but they are claiming a victory.
The Yakutia icebreaker left the embankment of the yard in St. Petersburg on April 4. The voyage goes around Scandinavia towards the Barents Sea and the vessel’s new homeport in Murmansk. Photo: Baltic Shipyard
PS> She passed by outside Ålesund late yesterday.
“Engine factory in Ukraine”?
I thought they had to substitute the Ukrainian steam turbines with ones from a domestic supplier already with Arktika and that was one of the key reasons why the lead ship was delivered almost three years late.
You missed one important word:
Energomashspetsstal is a foundry, not an engine factory. They were supposed to deliver some castings for the Project 10510 icebreaker under construction at Zvezda; I don’t know about their involvement in the Project 22220 built at Baltic Shipyard.
The backup diesel generators for the first three Project 22220 icebreakers were provided by Wärtsilä; for Yakutiya, they had to find another engine manufacturer. However, the engine in the photographs still looks hell of a lot like Wärtsilä 26…
The design contract for the next generation Baltic Sea assistance icebreaker for Finland has been awarded and it’s not hard to guess who will be responsible for developing the concept design.
What is likely to happen first; the melting of the Arctic sea ice, or delivery of a functioning icebreaker from a US shipyard?:
My money is on the ice melting. Really funny that DOGE didn’t look at the biggest part of the budget [which has never passed an audit] defense at all much less the defense contractors. They only went after SSA, health, science and of course the thing that makes the gap between the haves and have nots so great… DEI .
Former President Dwight Eisenhower said many years ago when he first entered office
“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.
This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some fifty miles of concrete pavement. We pay for a single fighter with a half-million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people. . . . This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.”
and in his farewell address said. “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex.” He also cautioned about the need for an “alert and knowledgeable citizenry” to ensure the proper balance between defense and peaceful progress.
Of course now that would be some communist socialist talk as the MIC has had politicians in their pocket and have had a fantastic propaganda machine for many years.
Meanwhile the 4th Russian built icebreaker of the Arktika-class has done it’s first “commercial” trip:
New icebreaker Yakutia makes maiden voyage to Sever Bay oil terminal in the Gulf of Yenisey. Photo: Rosatomflot
Finnish President Stubb is a good golfer and a good “used icebreaker salesman”
Problem is that Finland doesn’t have any “used icebreaker” for sale that would remotely meet the USCG requirement.
The nearest to it would be the Polaris, but that is built for Baltic service, with a minimum crew and with port calls for replenishing and refuelling every 10 days;
No doubt that Finnish designers are able to designe, and Finnish shipyards are able to build, icebreakers to meet USCG’s requirement at a lot lower cost (and on time) than any domestic US suppliers can, but how does that tally with US legislation, existing and proposed?
PS> Jones Act doesn’t apply to USCG vessels I believe?
I can think of two that are nearer than something tailored nearly without compromise for a specific mission that the USCG does not have. They are a bit older, though, but are still in excellent condition.
The biggest obstacle to the USCG getting new icebreakers is that no-one is doing anything. We could be well underway with a fast-track procurement of ships tailored to the Coast Guard’s specific needs and built at a US shipyard but months of inactivity and indecisiveness have turned into years of everyone just waiting for something to happen.
I’m honestly surprised that Chouest and Bollinger aren’t pushing these on the government. When Shell pulled out of the arctic, they got axed as well, but the plans seemed good at the time… and last I knew there was partial construction started on them, so there may be laid keels.
To my knowledge, all blocks built for the PC 3 AHTSs were scrapped when the order was cancelled.