5 thoughts on “China’s New Icebreaker

      • There aren’t many non-nuclear icebreakers that are more powerful than the 30,000 hp USCGC Healy. I don’t have the list at hand, but I can remember five existing (two American, three Russian), three under construction (all Russian), one or two ordered (Canadian and perhaps Australian), and the proposed USCG polar icebreaker. Yet, she’s always referred to as “medium” icebreaker…

      • @Chuck, the Wind class was actually quite modest at 9,000 kW while the 16,000 kW Glacier was comparable to today’s medium-sized icebreakers (Atle/Urho class, Kapitan Sorokin class).

        A good way to compare how “good” icebreakers are is to look at beam-power ratio vs. continuous icebreaking capability at 2 knots. Most icebreakers are near a curve that could be described as “minimum icebreaking capability for a well-designed icebreaker”, which divides the group into vessels with more emphasis on open water characteristics and those with more extreme icebreaker hull forms.

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