Canadian Coast Guard to Charter Finnish Icebreaker

Update? Announcement? Heads-Up?

Another surprise today. Every so often, something drops that gives me a bit of a giggle. Today is no different. The CCG has put out a new ACAN today, announcing their intent to charter a Polar Class 3 icebreaker for the upcoming season.

Such an idea isn't a new concept. It has been discussed in the past few years. Across the spectrum, Arctic powers have been trying to rapidly onboard icebreaker capacity in the face of an increasingly active Arctic. I am not necessarily in the Arctic-everything camp myself. I have made my opinions known on that, but countries have taken a very panicked view to what they see as a lack of ongoing capacity.

We'll get into all of that, though. I haven't done an ACAN post like this before. I feel I can run it like an RFI post? You guys let me know. I'm gonna take a shot because I feel this is worth posting about.

Let's not waste time!

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The Details

The CCG is looking for one fully crewed Polar Class 3 or higher icebreaker, chartered for a period of up to four months, commencing as early as July 16, 2026, and ending no later than November 30, 2026. The estimated value of the charter is $22 million.

With Arpatuuq not coming online until 2030, and the MPI and Program Icebreakers similarly pushed out into the 2030s, there exists an availability gap in the CCG icebreaking fleet that needs to be filled. If you want some actual reading material, the 2025-2026 Update to the CCG Integrated Business and Human Resource Plan is a great place to start.

The demand for icebreaking services is growing across the fleet, and while Canada executed on acquiring interim capability through the acquisition of the Tor Viking-class and CCGS Judy LaMarsh, we skipped on the opportunity to acquire a Polar Class vessel in the former Aiviq, now the USCGC Storis. She was on offer from Davie at the same time as the Tor Viking-class, but we chose to not execute on it. I digress, though.

The chartered vessel will perform tasking that would otherwise fall to a CCG hull, including Arctic icebreaking, ice escort, and route assistance anywhere in Canadian Arctic waters, including the Northwest Passage.

For the purpose of this requirement, the vessel must hold an IACS Polar Class 3 designation. It needs a minimum of three years of icebreaking and escort experience in Arctic or comparable ice-covered environments, icebreaking capability of a full metre at 3 knots, a power-to-displacement ratio of 1.55 or higher, a 200-tonne bollard pull to beam ratio, a length-to-beam ratio of 4:3 or more, and a range of 17,500 nautical miles at 11 knots.

It must sustain fourteen consecutive days of autonomous operations in remote Arctic waters without replenishment or external support, and it needs a helicopter landing facility capable of handling a CCG 429 helicopter.

The contractor keeps responsibility for operation, navigation, crewing, maintenance, safety management, certification, insurance, customs, and immigration clearances; so everything associated with lawfully running the vessel and crew in Canada.

CCG personnel will not crew the ship. At most, a liaison officer embarks to coordinate integration into CCG operations, with no responsibility for running the vessel. The supplier also has to demonstrate it can actually mobilize within the operational window, which matters when statements of capabilities close July 15, the day before the charter window opens.

The ACAN identifies the Finnish Fennica and Nordica as the only known commercially available Polar Class 3 icebreakers capable of meeting the operational, technical, and schedule requirements. They are the multipurpose icebreaker sisters currently operated by Arctia.

The pre-identified supplier, though, is not Arctia. It's (no surprise here) Qikiqtaaluk Arctic Horizon Services of Iqaluit, which the ACAN says is able to lease both vessels. I should have known they would pop up here when I first saw the notice. You might know Horizon if you follow the newsletter; they're our favorite private icebreaking firm that has been on an absolute expansion spree the last year, and they have been lobbying extremely hard to get an icebreaker lease on contract.

The company, along with the Membertou and Qalipu First Nation, acquired Newdock in St. John's back in September. They also moved to acquire Genoa Design International, one of the most experienced designers on Earth when it comes to working with ice-capable vessels and a major part of the NSS, in January.

A lot of this, though they might not say it, is to support the ambition of Horizon itself. The company has long eyed major expansion of its fleet, including the acquisition of Polar Class vessels. You might know one of their vessels, Horizon Arctic, from the Titan submersible incident. Horizon Arctic itself is a cool vessel, if I can quickly note that. She looks gorgeous. They're also the owners of the former CCGS Sir Humphrey Gilbert, now known as Polar Prince, under the Miawpukek Horizon Maritime Services partnership.

Securing an icebreaker lease has been less important, but still something they've been lobbying on forever. So I guess congrats to them. No shade, by the way; get your bag and such. The company has major ideas for modernizing Newdock and wants to be directly involved in the icebreaker game. The demand is there.

The procurement itself sits under the CFTA and no fewer than four Comprehensive Land Claims Agreements (Nunavut, James Bay and Northern Quebec, Labrador Inuit, and Inuvialuit), and the notice leans on the CFTA's exception for measures respecting Aboriginal peoples to square trade agreement coverage with limited tendering.

Of note, the ACAN is NOT the contract itself. It is an advance notice that the government intends to award a contract. If there are other potential suppliers available, they have the ability to submit a Statement of Capabilities before the window closes.

Given the requirements laid out, I can't think of anyone available who could fulfill them. Maybe someone knows something I don't, but I can't think of any available at this time. Neither are strangers to Canada, mind you. Nordica and Fennica were the first two Finnish icebreakers to cross the NWP back in 2015. Nordica then went on to break the record for the earliest transit of the NWP in 2017.

Arctia itself has had a long-standing relationship with Baffinland Iron Mines, which included deployments of both Nordica and Fennica. That agreement has ended, and so the two of them, as I know, are both available for the 2026 season, which opens the opportunities for Horizon and friends to jump in.

The Americans also had interest in Fennica, which they were rumored to have interest in purchasing last year in parallel to Storis. If Peter Rybski were here, he would tell you his story about trying to acquire Finnish icebreakers, I'm sure. The status of that deal is up in the air, aka I have no clue, because sadly my info on Finnish icebreaking is not up to date. I might have to ask.

It's an interesting way to add additional capacity for the season, at a price better than what I would expect for what we're getting. $22 million over the four-month season, which includes everything, feels like a fair price to pay in an environment where the current Polar fleet is strained to keep up both with the icebreaking season and further commitments domestically and abroad.

We're doing some really cool stuff this year. CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent will be returning to the North Pole this year. CCGS Pierre Radisson will be doing Nanook this summer. CCGS Sir Wilfrid Laurier is currently participating in Operation North Pacific Guard. There's a lot of cool, awesome stuff going on!

But as the CCG moves to the Defence Team, and their security mandate inevitably grows, the fleet will remain strained until we start to see significant delivery of the MPI and Program Icebreaker fleets. Both of which are again out into the 2030s. If Peter Rybski were here again, he would remind that Finnish yards could have one or two MPI done for 2031 if we really wanted.

We've elected not to do as the Americans and are willing to sacrifice a few years for domestic production. We can debate if that is the right call across the board, but for now, chartering vessels like Nordica/Fennica remains the only viable option we really have to rapidly onboard capacity and ships in the water. There ain't many PC 3 out there, and they go quickly on the market. One could probably argue locking them down, but I don't see that.