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December 14, 2013
Russians building world's largest nuclear powered ice breaker
Apropos of current weather...
On a scale of nautical coolness, monster ice breakers gotta be a solid 8/10 just because of the brute power they exert and pounding they take.
The 173m ship is being built by the Baltiysky Zavod shipyard in St Petersburg, and is planned to be completed by 2017. Once finished the ship will be 14 meters longer and 4 meters wider than the current record holder, “50 year Victory” that is 159 meters long and 30 meters wide...
...Powered by two “RITM-200” pressurized water reactors the “Arctic” is being built to generate 175MWe. Its efficiency and power allows the new model to crack ice fields 3 meters thick.
The Arctic will be granted the highest ice class – 9, meaning the ship will be able to break ice in the Arctic area all year round.
FWIW, the Russians have 5 nuclear powered ice breakers plying the Arctic. The USA has ummm....zero.
Also interesting...the AGU presentation on how Ra has gone quiet. Vid below the fold. WUWT has a post on Ra's lack of activity.
Interesting bit in the video -- increasing CO2 has been predicted to COOL the upper atmosphere.
The mayor of Jerusalem has declared a snow tsunami.
And of course, Cairo gets snow for the first time in 100 yearsOpen Thread