Radical New Icebreaker Will Travel Through the Ice Sideways

cylonlover writes "Given that icebreakers clear a path for other ships by traveling through the ice head-on (or sometimes butt-on), then in order for one of them to clear a wider path, it would have to be wider and thus larger overall ... right? Well, Finland's Arctech Helsinki Shipyard is taking a different, more efficient approach. It's in the process of building an asymmetric-hulled icebreaker that can increase its frontal area, by making its way through the ice at an angle of up to 30 degrees."

Comments

I suppose...

[benjfowler]

... you could call that:

*puts on sunglasses*

'lateral thinking'

been working on it for some time

[Trepidity]

Fwiw, the Finns have been researching this idea for a while now; interesting to see it actually being built. Here is a 1999 paper [pdf] from one of Arctech Helsinki's parent companies studying the feasibility of such a design, which has some good information on the details.

So,

[virgnarus]

Nautical drifting?

Waste of Time

[R3d M3rcury]

Just warm up the planet and then we won't have to worry about this "ice" stuff.

Re:Waste of Time

[FatLittleMonkey]

Already done. That's why these icebreakers are so useful.

By eliminating much of the multi-year ice, all they have to worry about is the thin smooth single-year ice that forms each winter; the stuff that icebreakers like. That greatly increases the chance of a viable shipping lane being breakable along its full length each year.

Re:Waste of Time

[CrimsonAvenger]

if anyone is really keen to swim in the lake that now exists on the North Pole

Two things:

1) it was only about a foot deep.

2) it's already gone away.

Re:Waste of Time

[starless]

While the z0mg!panic! was stupid, there is an issue here. Meltwater ponds reflect less sunlight than bare ice, so warm the ice underneath much quicker (until it cracks and the pond drains out.) [...]

Refereed article on this can be found here:

http://www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nclimate1963.html
The surface albedo of the Arctic sea-ice zone is a crucial component in the energy budget of the Arctic region1, 2. The treatment of sea-ice albedo has been identified as an important source of variability in the future sea-ice mass loss forecasts in coupled climate models3. There is a clear need to establish data sets of Arctic sea-ice albedo to study the changes based on observational data and to aid future modelling efforts. Here we present an analysis of observed changes in the mean albedo of the Arctic sea-ice zone using a data set consisting of 28 years of homogenized satellite data4. Along with the albedo reduction resulting from the well-known loss of late-summer sea-ice cover5, 6, we show that the mean albedo of the remaining Arctic sea-ice zone is decreasing. The change per decade in the mean August sea-ice zone albedo is 0.029±0.011. All albedo trends, except for the sea-ice zone in May, are significant with a 99% confidence interval. Variations in mean sea-ice albedo can be explained using sea-ice concentration, surface air temperature and elapsed time from onset of melt as drivers.

Re:Waste of Time

[You're All Wrong]

Turku? Far north? Prkl. Turku's a summer holiday destination it's so far south. Get your sunstroke drinking kossu at Ruisrock.

Re:Yay, onward march of technology

[jellomizer]

Or you could think of it rationally.
You have 1 Icebreaker taking one pass to do what it would take 3 to do.

They are still going to cut as much ice, they need it for shipping. It will just take less time, less fuel, and less ships. Better than the alternative.

Damn...

[QilessQi]

When I saw the "travelling sideways" thing I was hoping for a giant crab-shaped mecha.

Icebreakers work from above

[Teun]

Conventional ice breaking is done by the weight of the ship, the shape of the bow allows them to slide on top of it and once far enough the ice underneath will break, doing this sideways will be rather nasty for the stomach of the sailors on board.

Providing they have the horsepower it can be done in a relatively smooth way or they need to regularly back up for a new run onto the ice.

The ship in the article is 'only' fit for up to 60 cm. in sideways and 100 cm. of ice in regular mode, not exactly a lot of obstruction when you consider the typical ice sheet north of Russia is between 1.2 and 2.5 m. thick.

http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2012-09/russia-building-worlds-largest-nuclear-powered-icebreaker

Re:Icebreakers work from above

[pijokela]

It's meant for the Gulf of Finland near St. Petersburg. A PDF report at http://www.baltice.org/ shows that the thickest ice during 2011-2012 winter was 50cm.

It's true that as Russia is more and more interested in exploiting the arctic sea, they will need bigger things.

Re:Icebreakers work from above

[dan828]

You've never been for a ride on a "conventional" icebreaker, have you? The things are basically footballs(american) in the water. As a younger man, I was a deckhand on an ocean going icebreaker and did an arctic deployment. In rough seas we could take up to 90 degree rolls, though the biggest I saw was 67 degrees (fall in the north sea). Breaking pack ice in the arctic was like spending time on a randomly shifting roller coaster that occasionally slammed on the breaks and had to back up for another go. If you think this piddly little 30 degree lateral crabbing while breaking thin sea ice is going to be very bad, you just have no idea.

Re:It probably has some impact..

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, I'm not a scientist in this field of study, . . .

Obviously not.

Break ice into smaller pieces (e.g. cut huge swaths of it in half and so on), and it'll melt faster.

Maybe, but this is very thin sea ice (50-100 cm), which melts annually anyway. It's not like they're going into the icecaps with this thing.

As for the parent of your post, warming up the planet has increased the demand for ice breakers, because more places can now be reached. We might even finally see a northwest passage, but it will need an icebreaker to keep it open as long as possible. Russia has lots of icebreakers for reaching its northern border. Some of them are nuclear powered!

Re:Geometry

[EvilSS]

Vehicles are considered to be going sideways when they are moving along a vector that is noticeably out of alignment with the vehicle center line. This is not restricted to vehicles traveling at 90 degrees to their center line.