Tag Archives: Icebreaker

More News From the North–An Armed Canadian Coast Guard?

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Ryan Erickson’s blog pointed out an article in the Vancouver Sun reporting that the Canadians are considering arming their icebreakers as a way to “bolster Arctic sovereignty.”

This was in response to “recommendations in a report from the Senate fisheries committee about strengthening Canada’s presence in the North.”

“The government also has indicated that it will review new shipping regulations in the Northwest Passage and other Arctic waters with an eye to extending mandatory registration of foreign vessels, which currently applies only to large freighters and other heavy ships, to all foreign-ship traffic in the region, regardless of size.”

Ryan links the report to the 1985 transit of the North West Passage by the Polar Sea, in which the USCG icebreaker transited what the Canadians consider their internal waters and what the US considers an international strait, after the US gave notification of our intention, rather than asking permission.

Since then, basically the US and the Canadians have agreed to disagree. Currently the US and Canada have an agreement that allows access to US military ships. They have given us blanket permission and we have said we will give notification.

For the US Navy this is a matter of avoiding a precedence that could close off access elsewhere.

For the Coast Guard, our interests are a little different, perhaps closer to that of the Canadians. We want Maritime Domain Awareness. We want ships to give notice of their intentions, and ultimately that has to mean we need some options to deny access, but the international norms are still being set.

The talk of arming Canadian icebreakers leads to the question, will the Canadian Coast Guard be transformed by it’s new mission to more closely parallel the military organization of the USCG. There has already been a question about whether the Canadian Navy or their Coast Guard would man the proposed Arctic Patrol Ship since they would be armed, unlike current Canadian cutters.

The Coast Guard Meets With Potential OPC Builders, But No Rush

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Federal Times reports the Coast Guard is meeting with ship builders interested in participating in the Offshore Patrol Cutter (OPC) program, August 10-20. The plan is to build 25 ships to replace the entire existing fleet of WMECs (29 ships if I count right).

Federal Times quotes Carl McGill, surface systems chief for the Coast Guard and the OPC contracting officer, “After this round of talks is concluded, the next event for the OPC program will be an industry day, probably in November. A draft request for proposals is expected to be released “early next year,” McGill said, with a pre-solicitation conference to be held about a month later.

“Sometime next year three shipyards should receive Coast Guard contracts to prepare detailed OPC designs — an effort expected to take up to two years. A down-select to one shipyard is expected to be made in late 2014 or early 2015. The first OPCs are expected to be delivered in 2018 or 2019.”

And the oldest 210s will be how old then? 54 years old. Not to mention Acushnet and Alex Haley.

And when do we expect to see Arctic Patrol Cutters? And new Ice Breakers? Icebreaking tugs? Inland buoy tenders?

Are we behind the power curve? I know this is not the fault of the current administration, but we don’t seem to be making our case before Congress. Want to stimulate the economy. Ship building is a good way. We fought WWII in half the time it will take before we see the first OPC, and we did design and build a few ships during that time.

Think our MECs are having problems now, wait five years, no wait eight or nine.

And shouldn’t we really be building 33 to replace all the MECs and the short fall in 378 replacements.

We have to do better.