Yermak (1898 icebreaker)

Type

Icebreaker

Period

19th Century

Nation

Russia

Overview: Yermak was a Russian and later Soviet icebreaker built in 1898, widely regarded as the first true polar icebreaker, with a strengthened hull specifically shaped to ride up onto pack ice and crush it under the vessel's weight. The design was overseen by Vice-Admiral Stepan Makarov with a commission that included chemist Dmitry Mendeleev and engineers N. I. Yankovsky and R. I. Runeberg. Specifications: She was built of steel with a reinforced bow section of roughly 29mm plate sandwiched with oak and cork, allowing her to break ice over 7 feet thick. Per Wikipedia's infobox, displacement was about 8,730 tons, length 97.5 m, beam 21.6 m, draught 7.3 m, with four shafts driven by eight vertical triple-expansion steam engines and six boilers producing roughly 9,000 hp for a speed of 12 knots; her twin tall funnels and round, sloping bow made her instantly recognizable and became a template for later icebreaker design. Service History: Yermak was constructed at Armstrong Whitworth's Low Walker yard on the Tyne, launched on 17 October 1898, and completed/acquired in 1899 for the Imperial Russian Navy. In 1898 she steamed into the Barents Sea attempting to reach the North Pole; although she fell short of that goal, the voyage reaching 81°21'N north of Spitsbergen demonstrated that a purpose-built icebreaker could operate in ice-choked seas previously closed to shipping, and she went on to serve the Russian/Soviet navy and merchant marine for decades before being taken out of service in 1963 and scrapped in 1964. Notable Facts: Her military value was demonstrated during the Russo-Japanese War, and a devoted student of Makarov's who sailed on her early voyages, Konstantin von Schultz, later died alongside Makarov when the battleship Petropavlovsk was sunk by Japanese mines. A 1:100 scale model of Yermak in her original 1899 configuration is on permanent display at the International Maritime Museum Hamburg, making it a useful modern reference for modelers alongside the surviving pre-1917 photographs.