The largest US steel mill in the state of Indiana suspended work in connection with the termination of the delivery of iron ore by barges on the Great Lakes. Because of the prolonged winter, they are constrained by the ice, which interfere with navigation.
Two great lakes icebreaker operate on the lakes, but they are still powerless to provide transport vessels with a safe passage among floating massive blocks of ice up to 4.3 m in height. The ice, for the first time in 35 years, covers more than 90% of the surface of lakes, which makes it impossible to transport ore from Minnesota.
Icebreaker Mackinaw with a caravan of barges has been on the road for seven days and has not yet left Lake Superior. According to Levy Reed, a representative of the US Coast Guard, a significant increase in air temperature is needed to normalize navigation. Icebreakers will be involved in the Great Lakes until May inclusive.
On Thursday morning, icebreakers of the Canadian Coast Guard and the US Coast Guard launched simultaneous operations to eliminate the ice crust off the shores of the Great Lakes.
Icebreaker Mackinaw will stay till spring
Works almost synchronously began on the lakes: Huron, Saint Clair, Erie, Ontario, and the Detroit River. Arthur M Anderson news consisted in the fact that he was literally rescued from under the ice thickness. If it were not for the timely actions of the rescuers, irreparable things could happen.
First of all, icebreakers try to remove hummocks and ice from the ways that cargo ships and barges usually go.
The management of the Coast Guard both in the US and Canada closely watches the progress of work and the state of the ice cover on the Great Lakes.
Last year, ice became a major problem for ships delivering cargo to enterprises. According to scientists, at the beginning of March, about 92% of the Great Lakes water area was covered with ice, which is a record since 1979.