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ArlyA
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- Mar 18, 2016
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I caught a few shots of the Bristol Bay CG tug when he passed through town a few years ago
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This ice breaking tug is named, fittingly, for Bristol Bay, a bay located within the state of Alaska and bordered by the Bering Sea. The Bristol Bay is known in the Coast Guard as a "One-Forty", a class of dual purpose harbor tugs that, while capable of ice breaking, can also be combined with a companion 120-foot Aid-to-Navigation (ATON) barge to form a much larger integrated ship unit. Sister ships on the Great Lakes include the Neah Bay (Cleveland, Ohio), Katami Bay (Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan), Mobile Bay (Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin), and Biscayne Bay (St. Ignace, Michigan). Among the Great Lakes fleet, only the Bristol Bay and Mobile Bay have the companion ATON barge unit.
Without the barge attached, the ship is 140 feet long and weighs over a million pounds! With 2,500 horsepower, it can continuously break ice almost two feet thick, especially when aided by its special air bubbling units which inject air under the ice to help dislodge it. Two-foot-thick ice, however, is not the upper limit, as the ship has often broken through ice windrows 10-12 feet tall!
When the Bristol Bay's bow settles into the vee-notch of the barge, the combined vessel becomes 245 feet in overall length. The ATON barge provides a large deck for storing and working aids to navigation, a crane to lift and lower these big buoys, vast storage below for auxiliary gear like an underwater remote video camera, as well as additional crew berthing and accommodations. The barge has a powerful bow thruster which is controlled from the bridge of the tug, making the combined barge/tug vessel very maneuverable.
Our in town ski area seen in the background
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This ice breaking tug is named, fittingly, for Bristol Bay, a bay located within the state of Alaska and bordered by the Bering Sea. The Bristol Bay is known in the Coast Guard as a "One-Forty", a class of dual purpose harbor tugs that, while capable of ice breaking, can also be combined with a companion 120-foot Aid-to-Navigation (ATON) barge to form a much larger integrated ship unit. Sister ships on the Great Lakes include the Neah Bay (Cleveland, Ohio), Katami Bay (Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan), Mobile Bay (Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin), and Biscayne Bay (St. Ignace, Michigan). Among the Great Lakes fleet, only the Bristol Bay and Mobile Bay have the companion ATON barge unit.
Without the barge attached, the ship is 140 feet long and weighs over a million pounds! With 2,500 horsepower, it can continuously break ice almost two feet thick, especially when aided by its special air bubbling units which inject air under the ice to help dislodge it. Two-foot-thick ice, however, is not the upper limit, as the ship has often broken through ice windrows 10-12 feet tall!
When the Bristol Bay's bow settles into the vee-notch of the barge, the combined vessel becomes 245 feet in overall length. The ATON barge provides a large deck for storing and working aids to navigation, a crane to lift and lower these big buoys, vast storage below for auxiliary gear like an underwater remote video camera, as well as additional crew berthing and accommodations. The barge has a powerful bow thruster which is controlled from the bridge of the tug, making the combined barge/tug vessel very maneuverable.
Our in town ski area seen in the background
