48-Year-Old Icebreaker Polar Star Departs on Antarctic Mission

The U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Polar Star set sail from Seattle on Friday, embarking on its 28th Operation Deep Freeze, the yearly breakout through the ice of McMurdo Sound to resupply America's Antarctic research base. Polar Star is a key link in the logistics for the United States Antarctic Program (USAP), supplying 1,200 scientists and support personnel on the frozen continent. The USAP says that its work is vital not just for scientific understanding, but for maintaining America's strategic presence in Antarctica's remote, challenging environments.

"After months of pre-deployment preparation and working together through various challenges, the cutter and crew are ready to embark on this enduring and critical mission,” said Capt. Jeff Rasnake, Polar Star’s commanding officer. “I couldn’t be prouder of this crew’s tremendous dedication and teamwork. They have met or exceeded all my expectations in the maintenance and training phases and continue to push themselves to build upon those successes as we now shift into the cutter’s operations phase.” 

Courtesy USCG

Polar Star is now 48 years old, and her Cold War-era engineering has defied expectations for longevity, thanks in no small part to the efforts of her crew and her shipyard maintainers. She undergoes a drydocking period every single year - five times as often as a normal ship - in order to combat the fatigue of heavy icebreaking duty on her aging systems. In recent years her crew has had to make challenging underway repairs in austere, remote environments, including an unscheduled dive operation in icy water to plug a shaft seal leak earlier this year. 

Divers work to secure a shaft seal leak while under way off Antarctica, January 27, 2024 (Courtesy USCG)

The U.S. Coast Guard is in the midst of a recapitalization program to rebuild its icebreaking capabilities, and its three-vessel Polar Security Cutter series will replace Polar Star on the Antarctic supply route - when the first vessel delivers. The PSC program is heavily delayed and will not be ready for years. The need is urgent, the Coast Guard says, given Polar Star's advancing age and an increasing presence of Chinese and Russian forces in the Arctic.