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Only a handful of ships are reinforced to travel over light ice. They're called "ice strengthened" or "ice class" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_class https

Only a handful of ships are reinforced to travel over light ice. They're called "ice strengthened" or "ice class" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_class https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_class). They're really not intended to charge head-long into ice, but are safer when in waters that may contain random and hard to spot chunks of ice. I'm not aware of any American combat ships outfitted to that standard. In fact, when it comes to ice-hardened ships in general the US has shockingly few, perhaps only two depending on maintenance cycles: https://warontherocks.com/2016/10/icebreakers-and-u-s-power-separating-fact-from-fiction/ https://warontherocks.com/2016/10/icebreakers-and-u-s-power-... An icebreaker (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icebreaker https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icebreaker) is meant to go charging through and in some cases even over ice. They're tough as hell compared to most ships. The reason the bow is stronger isn't because of ice, it's because of the pressure exerted on the bulbous bow. It's a spherical protrusion that will have to be tougher or it'll collapse.

dghughes 9y ago
> An icebreaker is meant to go charging through and in some cases even over ice. There seems to be confusion in that sentence, an icebreaker "goes through ice" meaning it works in a region with ice not literally plowing through the ice. Although if the ice is loose and floating yes but an icebreaker is designed with a sloped bow that rides up onto ice and then the ship's weight pushes down breaking the ice. No ship pushes through ice it would be like trying to push on two ends of an egg. My dad worked for the Canadian Coast Guard for 33 years. He said for really thick ice (several meters) they'd sometimes have to use the ship's crane with a large cement block and pound at the ice at the sides of the ship. The crane is normally used for buoys. Sea ice, pack ice is like concrete great in compression but fails when a multi 100 ton ship in sitting on top (to a limit). This was the ship my dad served on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CCGS_Earl_Grey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CCGS_Earl_Grey

dghughes 9y ago

> An icebreaker is meant to go charging through and in some cases even over ice. There seems to be confusion in that sentence, an icebreaker "goes through ice" meaning it works in a region with ice not literally plowing through the ice. Although if the ice is loose and floating yes but an icebreaker is designed with a sloped bow that rides up onto ice and then the ship's weight pushes down breaking the ice. No ship pushes through ice it would be like trying to push on two ends of an egg. My dad worked for the Canadian Coast Guard for 33 years. He said for really thick ice (several meters) they'd sometimes have to use the ship's crane with a large cement block and pound at the ice at the sides of the ship. The crane is normally used for buoys. Sea ice, pack ice is like concrete great in compression but fails when a multi 100 ton ship in sitting on top (to a limit). This was the ship my dad served on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CCGS_Earl_Grey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CCGS_Earl_Grey