Mikula : a Canadian icebreaker repatriated

• Published in: Polar Record
• Main Authors: Barr, William, Appleton, Thomas E.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge University Press (CUP) 1982
• Subjects: General Earth and Planetary Sciences; Ecology; Geography, Planning and Development; Montreal Island; Polar Record
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0032247400004228; https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0032247400004228

On the afternoon of 13 March 1931 a massively-built icebreaker could be seen smashing her way through the ice in the shipping channel off Pointe-aux-Trembles at the east end of Montreal Island. The name on her bows was Mikula ( Montreal Gazette , 1931a, p 23). The following afternoon, accompanied by the smaller icebreaker Saurel , she pulled alongside at the Imperial Oil Company's wharf in Montreal East, to be met by a large crowd, led by the Minister of Marine and Fisheries, the Honourable Albert Duranleau ( Montreal Gazette , 1931b, p 21). Captain John Hearn welcomed the minister on board, then took him and his party out among the river ice to show off Mikula's paces. The cause of all the excitement was that Mikula had reached Montreal 15 days earlier than the previous record, set by the icebreaker Lady Grey in 1921. Hence Montreal had come a significant step closer to her present situation of being a year-round port.