Photos: U.S. Coast Guard Icebreaker Reaches Antarctica’s McMurdo Station

The U.S. Coast Guard’s heavy icebreaker USCGC Polar Star (WAGB 10) arrived in Antarctica this week as part of its annual resupply mission to McMurdo Station, the U.S. Antarctic Program’s logistical hub and largest station on the frozen continent.

Operation Deep Freeze is a joint military service mission to resupply U.S. National Science Foundation research stations in Antarctica.

This year’s mission marks Polar Star’s 26th voyage to the frozen continent, where it is tasked with breaking a navigable channel through miles of ice to allow fuel and supply ships to reach McMurdo Station’s ice pier.

At 46-years-old, Polar Star is the United States’ only operational heavy icebreaker.

This year also marks the Polar Star’s second year returning to Antarctica after the 2021 operation was put on hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Polar Star’s efforts are already starting to bear fruit. The icebreaker was joined by the Military Sealift Command-charted cargo ship Ocean Giant is carrying 443 pieces of cargo, which included containers filled with mechanical parts, vehicles, construction materials, office supplies and electronics equipment and vehicles.

The ship was loaded with a floating causeway that will be assembled in Antarctica and used for cargo offload operations instead of the traditional McMurdo Station ice-pier, which was deemed unusable for this year’s mission.

This year a second MSC-chartered ship, Ocean Gladiator, will bring in 361 pieces of cargo, mostly construction materials to be used for an expansion project at the McMurdo facility.