Ice Breaking Services News

The U.S. Coast Guard on Monday commenced Operation Coal Shovel, a domestic icebreaking operation to maintain commercial vessel traffic from southern Lake Huron to Lake St. Clair, to the St. Clair / Detroit River system, and into Lake Erie and Lake Ontario including the St. Lawrence Seaway.U.S. and Canadian Coast Guard icebreakers work together in these waterways as conditions worsen throughout the winter to ensure the ability to conduct search-and-rescue, exigent community service, and the facilitation of navigation to meet the reasonable demands of commerce.Both the U.S.

Swedish company Viking Supply Ships said Thursday that its Chief Financial Officer Morten G. Aggvin would step down.He has informed the offshore vessel operator that he will resign from his position to pursue challenges outside Viking Supply Ships."He will remain in the position until March 1, 2022. The company has initiated a recruitment process to identify Mr. Aggvin’s successor," Viking Supply Ships said.Morten G. Aggvin has been employed in Viking Supply Ships A/S since 2012. He has previous experience from several positions within finance and analysis, and holds a Siviløkonom degree from the University of Agder.Viking Supply Ships specializes in the provision of offshore support and ice-breaking services, with activities primarily in Arctic and subarctic areas.

The Great Lakes Towing Company said it is expanding its harbor towing and ice breaking services to Sturgeon Bay, Wis.The Towing Company has undertaken a fleet renewal program that began with the laying of 10 keels in August 2016. Since that time, the company has added five new Damen Stan 1907 ICE design tugs to its fleet, with the sixth new tug being delivered next month, and the seventh in Spring 2022.There will now be two Towing Company tugs stationed in Sturgeon Bay full-time, including a former Navy YTB.

Svitzer Europe took delivery of the first of two new icebreaking tugs from Med Marine to support its operations in Scandinavia.After mobilizing from the shipyard on the Black Sea, Svitzer Embla will arrive and start working in Sweden in the beginning of April 2021. Soon after, in the beginning of May 2021, the second tug, Svitzer Edda, will be delivered and start mobilizing towards Denmark, where she will serve a large variety of customers throughout Scandinavia. The 30-meter…

The Great Lakes Towing Company said it has repositioned its Tug Huron to Duluth, Minn. on Monday, January 2, 2017 to enhance capabilities for icebreaking, harbor assist and other services essential to commercial shipping in the Duluth-Superior region. The Tug Huron’s first icebreaking operation of 2017 took place late Wednesday evening, January 4 when she assisted longstanding customer, Canada Steamship Lines M/V Thunder Bay in the Port of Duluth. In addition to Huron, the Towing Company’s harbor fleet in Duluth now includes to Tugs Arkansas…

The U.S. Coast Guard officially commenced Operation Coal Shovel, Tuesday, encompassing domestic ice-breaking operations in southern Lake Huron, Lake St. Clair, the St. Clair / Detroit River system, Lake Erie, Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence Seaway. U.S. and Canadian Coast Guard icebreakers work together to break ice in these waterways as conditions worsen throughout the winter. The Coast Guard conducts domestic ice-breaking operations for the purposes of search-and-rescue, and…

Denmark's Svitzer, the world's biggest tugboat operator, said on Monday it has established a harbour towage service in the Port of Montreal providing shipdocking, escort and ice-breaking services. Svitzer, a unit in shipping and oil group A.P. Moller-Maersk , said in a statement it has mobilized two ice-class tugs to the port and a third tug will arrive in mid-April. "Canada is one of our key growth markets in the Americas," the company added. Svitzer reshuffled its organisation in August in a bet to speed up growth in the Middle East, Africa and Asia. Reporting by Ole Mikkelsen

While the large oceangoing variety of ships garners the lion’s share of attention in regards to Arctic operations, modern offshore vessels that will be required to support potential oil and gas business in the region are equally vital. Viking Supply Ships recently carried out full scale ice trials in the Gulf of Bothnia on the Brage Viking, an 85m long anchor handling tug supply (AHTS) type offshore support vessel delivered  from Zamakona shipyard in Spain two years ago. The AHTS was built to Finnish-Swedish ice class 1A standards and is powered by a pair of MaK 8M32C 4…

Canada will have trouble ensuring marine safety in the Arctic as climate change melts the sea ice and shipping increases, Parliament's environmental watchdog said on Tuesday. Canada, said Environment Commissioner Julie Gelfand, had "no long-term national vision" to cope with more shipping in the region, where firms are trying to exploit reserves of oil, gold, diamonds, iron ore, zinc and other commodities. Gelfand said many high-risk areas in the Arctic had been inadequately surveyed.

The U.S. Coast Guard commenced Operation Taconite this afternoon in response to colder temperatures and the resultant ice growth in the western Great Lakes region. Operation Taconite is the Coast Guard’s largest domestic icebreaking operation, encompassing Lake Superior, St. Mary’s River, the Straits of Mackinac, and northern Lake Huron. As a result of the operation, certain waterways may close once due consideration is given to the protection of the marine environment, waterway improvements, aids to navigation, the need for cross-channel traffic (e.g. ferries), the availability of icebreakers, and the safety of the island residents, who in the course of their daily business use naturally formed ice bridges for transportation to and from the mainland.

A Connecticut-based Coast Guard cutter is scheduled to deploy to the Great Lakes Nov. 29, 2010, to assist in the service's icebreaking mission there throughout the winter months. The crew of the Coast Guard Cutter Morro Bay, a 140-ft icebreaking tug, will arrive in the Great Lakes region a few weeks after it departs its homeport of New London, Conn. While there, the crew will assist those of other Coast Guard icebreakers during Operations Coal Shovel and Taconite, the largest domestic ice breaking operations in the country.