arctic icebreakers

[denniswalker]

Another programme if you dont fancy the olympics
on channel 5 at 20.00 is a programme about ships that carry cargo through ice bound water might be interesting.

[j.sabourn]

Denis, as we dont have your same tv out here in Oz, would be interesting to know if they show Port Churchill during the navigational season. We always used to carry plenty of cement to pour concrete if necessary into the forepeak in the case of being caught in ice. How they would ever get this out again God knows. As you know the theory on breaking ice is to go and try and use the weight of the ship on top of it to break, and not necessarily to go ploughing head on at. Should be an interesting program. Cheers John Sabourn

[denniswalker]

Hi john the programme was actually called big,bigger,biggest.It started with first icebreaker built to keep the port of Hamburg clear of ice,then went on mostly about a Russian taanker that was designed as a icebreaker to get to a russian refinery that was frozen for ten months of the year.she had two pods port and starboard,as well as her main prop,this was if the ice was thick for headway motion she could go sternfirst and the two pods would the ice and keep it clear of the ships side.I cant remember the of the tanker,but it was very interesting to watch. Cheers dennis

[j.sabourn]

When you say pods where were these situated. I was on a fairly small norwegian vessel (nothing to do with ice) but we were able to shut the main engines down drop this azimuth propellor through the ships bottom and got directional propulsion of about 3 to 4 knots off this. Saved a heck of a lot of fuel. Thought someone might have come up with an idea for something like this for ice navigation. Cheers John Sabourn

[denniswalker]

John,i dont recall the actual name of the pods,but they were on the port and starboard side just fwd of the main prop.cheers dennis

[John Arton]

Hi
Believe this prog. was first shown on Nat Geo. some months ago. Think I actually put up a post about it at the time.
Did not see last nights prog as was busy but if it was the same as the one I saw on Nat. Geo. then it was fascinating watching seeing a huge tanker breaking through ice metre thick with the aid of its onboard systems. If I remember correctly to pods at the bow are there to send aireated water down the ships side in order to allow it to "slide" through the broken ice, making the ship slippery in the water/ice.

rgds
JA

[denniswalker]

Hi john,if this on nat geo,i did not see it,sorry,but the pods were definately aft.on the programme there was a german icebreaker in the sixties that used theaireated water down the ships side,but idont remember seeing on the tanker,mind you it was impressive to see a tanker going stern first through thick ice. Cheers dennis

[Ivan Cloherty]

Hi
Believe this prog. was first shown on Nat Geo. some months ago. Think I actually put up a post about it at the time.
Did not see last nights prog as was busy but if it was the same as the one I saw on Nat. Geo. then it was fascinating watching seeing a huge tanker breaking through ice metre thick with the aid of its onboard systems. If I remember correctly to pods at the bow are there to send aireated water down the ships side in order to allow it to "slide" through the broken ice, making the ship slippery in the water/ice.

rgds
JA

In last nights programme the tanker had two Azimuth Pods at the stern, don't honestly remember a third main propeller. The pods drove the ship forwards when the ice was less than a metre thick pushing the bow onto the ice so that the weight of the vessel broke the ice. If the ice was over a metre thick the vessel stopped in the water and rotated each azimuth through 360 degrees in opposite directions, this cleared an ice free area around the vessel. The vessel was then swung through 180 degrees and navigated stern first through the thick ice. The stern of the vessel was bow (lip) shaped and the azimuth propellers were designed to draw water from under the thick ice which effectively drew ice into the specially hardened propellers to break it up. The maximum speed the vessel could make in this thick ice going stern first was 1.5 knots, they covered the last 60 miles of their voyage like this. This vessel did not have the airflow system mentioned above, she had a specially designed paint that resisted snow covered ice which is apparently very abrahsive. They did give a reason why the airflow system wasn't fitted to the tanker but I cannot recall what it was, it was something to with cargo, where-as the dedicated icebreakers did not carry cargo.

The master had personal control of the two azipods during the whole 14 hours of the loading process, only when the hose was disconnected did he hand over the watch to another officer (a deputy master ?) The azipods had to be in constant use as the ice was moving the vessel around all the time

The airflow system mentioned was fitted to the forward section of a 17000 tonne Atomic powered icebreaker (in the same programme) which was a leading a convoy of ships north about and it was interesting to note that the first ship astern of the ice breaker was a "Liberty" ship and as the icebreaker was built in 1967 the old Liberty was still giving sterling service for a "one tripper".

All in all a very interesting programme and presented in a more factual manner that retained your interest and I do hope I have remembered the facts correctly

[denniswalker]

Hi all,i apologise if i got some info wrong. Ivan thak you for the names azipods. On the programme,i think that the mame of the atomic powered icebreaker was the Lenin,i may be wrong. Cheers dennis

[Captain Kong]

I only saw the first half, I had to turn over to ITV to watch the `Monkees`, David Jones was a relative and he died in February this year whilst I was on my trip. We had a party with him last year when he last came over from Florida.
.
Now the Pod was the same shape as the ones on Queen Mary 2, and could rotate 360,. They had one that could pulverise the ice, I think.
I also think the programme was on some time before on Channel 38, QUEST. in the `BIG, BIGGER, BIGGEST` SERIES.
Brian.