BOTNICA Icebreaker

by Delmi Alvarez

Port of Helsinki, on board of the Botnica icebreaker
Friday 13 of February 2004

Juha, the head of officials watched me at the eyes with a slight smile in its lips and came very concientiously to explain me one to one the norms that it would have to consider on board during my stay:
"1. if it sounds to the fire siren your zone of meeting it is number 2 closely together of your stateroom.
2. when you finish of ducharte you do not leave the door of the opened bath, the steam of the shower could make jump the alarms against fires installed in the ceiling and would generate a general alert.
3. In case of shipwreck you have an emergency reserve in the closet of your room, if it does not give time you is another closet with more suits in the cover near the assigned zone. the 3.
4. schedules of meals are for all the equal and the cafeteria will be opened 24 hours, with coffee, tea and fruit ".

I settled in stateroom 523, extensive, with telephone, radio, and two well ironed, smooth bunks, two fresh towels and, two soap tablets and one lamp on a table a window allowed to see the port cover. It did not wait for something similar, a luxury for me, customary to perhaps sail in other boats with much less space. It had always dreamed from my childhood to raise icebreakers someday, and to live an only and wonderful adventure, of being able to write on board about the life, of as the boat works, and of as breaks the ice, mainly after to have seen in an album, photos of an old wolf of sea.
In that occasion the old sailor spoke of several histories about the ships icebreakers to me, but he enormously was touched when telling me one in special story of gratitude that him had to a captain when gambling the life to save it to him and his companions of crew.

I does not fail my memory when I counting it, because still the story is very fresh in my mind, although that old man passed away years ago already.
MI remember that in an occasion, Ramon, the old sailor of hair and white beard, untiring Dutch tobacco smoker of pipe, taught his oldalbum to me of photos in black and white, many of them aged by the passage of time in color sepia (brown), and were stopped specially in which they brought some memories to him.
It was summer time when Ramon told the story to me, next to the sea, with the gulls screamed and some fellow saluted to him during tour chatting:
-so long Moncho (nickname of Ramon)
-so long Pepe,
But Moncho?s smile changed when it arrived at a special photo. The picture was a ship with two chimneys fighting against the ice, raising to squash it and to follow way. The photo was in black and white, become stiff, beautiful, matchless, with a small white margin to his around that the old man held with force with his great and strong thumbs and index of sailor, remained seeing it a moment and looking at him I was surprised by its reaction,
I saw as the photo began to shake in its hand. It approached his left hand to clean one more a soaked tear in salt, the salt of all his life in the sea, the saltpeter that for more than 40 years had swallowed by the seas of the world.
-What happens Moncho? I asked to him,
-"Nothing, single are memories", said to me.
I put my arm to him on the shoulder and approached my face hers, tenderly, with the other I caressed the face to him hoping that it understood my preoccupation and my solidarity. Their eyes were now a sea enraged in salt water and very instinctively it was fused with me in a hug, but little it lasted, I do not know many sailors to which the tears escape to them easily.
He returned to the word and taking hold this time with more force the photo he began to explain the memories to me that brought to him. It was a story that happened in the gulf of Botnia, when he worked like machinist in a freight-carrying boat and that it was catched in the ice of the gulf of Botnia.
"That was a terrible winter, with much cold and snow and our crew who never exceeded the 15 men had seen nothing equal or similarity, marine we are from other latitudes, men of sea of parallel 40, customary more to the heat than to the cold.
The captain of our boat was a man who never spoke too much with the crew and their second officials described him as somebody to whom the sea had given everything to him and also cleared.
In a shipwreck when doubling the horrible Strait of Magellan died almost all the crew and he survived next to other three more. Since then those that deal with him not know friends, and its life on board is solitary and strange. He is a wounded captain and when a captain is wounded is like a lion rolling by the forest, single it wishes that someday honor to its profession can die in the sea, doing and for his bad luck the company for which worked had warned him already that its retirement in the next year.

Ramon returned to see the photo and he remained by more time, and while he told me that the crew saved its lives thanks to the icebreaker captain.

A telephone call to my stateroom woke up me of that memory and Juha to the other side of the apparatus communicated to me that the captain hoped in the bridge to explain as they were going to carry out unties of the ship and the exit of port.
I raised several plants until arriving at the place, greeted the officials and I was very kind to all the maneuver. In a board a message could be read to attend the Sussanne, a small freighter that by lack of power could not lay way between the ice. Juha Varis the captain of the Botnica, maneuvered in the operation of unties, its side they attend senior officers to him Thymus Lappalainen and its second Christian Wallius. The second turn forms Juha Rautakorpi and its second Roy Eriksson.
For these two teams of officials single a commitment exists during three weeks: the one to open routes of navigation to the boats that therefore need it in the zone that has been assigned to the west of Finland, in the port of Rauma. During the trip to the entrusted zone the Botnica receives a call of the Susanne, a small freighter that transports sugar until the port of Kantvik roads.

"Their motors do not have the power necessary to break the ice" says Thymus while it observes the screen of the radar and is helped by Christian that loads in another computer the maps of the zone. It is not easy to sail between small islands of the Archipelago, because sometimes the depth is small and if there is wind the icy patches move, that damages the helmet of the boat that this catching. Icebreaker they contribute to know the thickness the ice in diverse points of mar.y by decision of the captain, Raimond is sent to open a hole in the ice with a special drill by where it will introduce a twig that will measure the thickness. These data are sent by in a report to the central office of the company developing the corresponding maps of aid to navigation. Entrance the night the Botnica would already attend the Flinthern.

Captain Juha Varis, 53,  was born in the east of Finland, in the field, "to the sailors we likes to go to the sea for a while". For Juha they are at the moment 33 years in the sea, seven of which they were around the world in ships position and three studying.
All the officials must be a time working in position ships. It is a certificate to work in the icebreakers
A day he says: is enough for me" and he decided to begin to work in the icebreakers. Juha is in front of me, seated comfortably near a table with radio instruments. I transmit all my confidence to him so that it tells some me of its stories in the sea.
All the sailors have them, although all they do not loosen them to the first of change. Juha is different, measured enough in the word, that is very technical and professional, and teaches several navigation charts to me or it gives to explanations on the screen of the IBN net, the best system of positioning of the boats in real time.
"Every winter is different", says the captain, "with days where the boats are stopped and without activity and others where the work overflows to us". "For example as the case of 50 boats hoping, catched in the ice of the gulf of Botnia, without being able to move towards any side and with the ice pressing on the helmet.
Very we were occupied, and single after one week the boats were attended and the captains and crews began to be more relaxed "In that time of delay the crew, - many of which are of countries of the Asian east -, do not have experience of survival in the ice and can get to feel panic, something very habitual in the weathers. Many boats cannot arrive at port without the aid of the icebreakers "are during days without being able to move. The delay can get to be until from two or three days "it assures Juha," but memory of to have released to boats catched in the ice with than one week hoping more ".
Sometimes usually happens in all the winters when the wind is very strong, the ice begins to move, and for a small boat in these conditions the situation can be very dangerous, since it begins to block it and little by little it is it pressing until the ice raises by the cover and it covers it, deforms the helmet to him or it causes water routes to him that quickly it will have to drain with motobombas. When the forecasts of weather of snow or wind are of 100 %, we warned by the radio and we mainly say they that must be had left in port, and not to risk lives and goods, because we are not going to have time for all" Juha makes a pause in the conversation and thinks about the next words in broken silence by qrm of the radio in VHF.

I returned at midnight to my stateroom, tired and with desire to write and I put in the shower to sleep fresh. I opened the door of the bath quickly remembering the words of Juha and I threw in the bed listening the news of the BBC in my old Phillips of medium wave.

I took the photo, and flipped it and saw that were words written in her. It was the greeting of a captain to a friend:
-"To old Ramon wolf of sea and infinite friend by the moments lived in that so cruel winter. You Eero fellow".

"Our captain had defied the captain of the icebreakers, that he had recommended to hope to him in the assigned position until they arrived, and issued the orders to me:
-Moncho, to all machine.
Those words sound to me in the head as it happened yesterday  he said,  "But as we are going to break the ice if hardly this boat gives a short power? said to me very afraid and upset my second official,
-it says the captain and it is enough, I said to him, and comes to work!!

We took sugar to Oulu and we would return with paper paste. At that time there were no means to know as the ice were above. We communicated by radio in channel 9 and VHF, or by short wave, but in winter and to those latitudes they mix multitude of channels. Outside it made a cold horrible and nobody wanted to go out to cover. The 10 that we formed the crew we feared the worse thing, and mainly, which worried more to us is that that captain took to us to the anchorage of the frozen sea because of his memories and of which had happened to him in the Strait of Magellan.

The old Perkinson singing good the valves of diesel engine like never, and all the horses that took in their inside rode to the unisonous one, one behind another one, but it knew that that would last little. Take oil my friends, it said and a little fat as well, because you must remove to us from this hell in which a crazy person has put us.


Saturday 14 of February 2004 04,30 a.m..
Jarmo Sotka kneaded the flour to prepare the bread of the food of the 11.30. In another side of the kitchen Jarmo Paavola, second cook of the Botnica, it had well stingy the frying pan by the handle to which it gave I am called on him to remove the meat of a soup. "Here we worked in equipment" says to me, and although it is chef always likes he to learn of the others and it motivates to him. "nothing is Never old, always there are reasons to know more and more in the life and? mainly in the kitchen ". Jarmo cut vegetables, tomatos, peppers and fried and it gave returns him to slices of bread of mold soaked in chocolate and I comine for the dessert. Throughout that time we could get involved in a very pleasant conversation, - in the good kitchens of chefs it is spoken of many things and very varied like good the cooks join themselves with others to speak of their things -. said to a friend chef to Me of a restaurant in Paris for a long time "I have been liking the kitchens and to cook, perhaps because to know how to cook or to try to know how to cook implies to want to make friends. I never cook for me or as soon as I do it, he is boring, I prefer to lower to the bar of the corner and to eat something to deceive the stomach, a hamburger or fried eggs, but when she is to cook for the friends or for somebody I she likes to put to me thoroughly, to have clean and prepared everything and to develop or inclusively to improvise while I cook. In Poland the future spouses enchant to them to cook for their future husband and pass an examination practical that she consists of inviting it to house and preparing best plates to him. If the fianc? is satisfied, she will be happy, because she means that it liked ". Returning to the kitchen, Jarmo emphasizes at the end of the conversation: The feeding on board is extremely important and for that reason the food must be varied and be entertained ".

Is San Valentin, day of the enamored and SignE sends sms to me with congratulations. I do not believe in the day of San Valentin, because like other dates are consumists days, in whom it seems that necessarily we must give because the announcements in TV remember us and we felt obligatorily motivated to give. It seems because if we did not give something good and important is not going to us to want more than what we thought. In the Botnica there are no celebrations by San Valentin.

The sailors do not know much of that, or they do not want to give much importance him, since once on board of a boat another life begins very different from the one from earth. Somebody commented to me years ago on the old wolves of sea that when it arrives to them the hour of the retirement begins its true torment. What I can do in earth, if all my life I have passed it in the sea. This question became a friend while we spoke of the sea and its way of life and which can get to mark in a person. The sea is tranquillity, a horizon in calm or enraged, it is nature, it is coexistence, it is daily fight, and no day he is equal to another one.
Why the Botnica has been discarded the day of San Valentin, here each one has or not its pair in earth and when it enters the boat is important to maintain the feelings remote. It asked to him an official about the infidelity of a woman married with a sailor who goes, two or three or four or including up to 6 months in the sea without stepping on earth.
"I do not think too much about that, better to be made to the idea that your woman is faithful and whom she has of everything in house. He depends on each relation and if of course you do not trust her the best thing is olvidarte and to leave it. It is not possible to be left to the sea with those problems, the sea in himself already is a very great problem, because you never know that surprise can keep to you, is a world opened to the chances and which are to have deep respect to him".
In the engine room Ilpo Kyntola he goes from a side to another one, reviewing the motors, checking controls, maintaining levels, is engine repairman, man for everything there down, in the same hell of noise and in the heat of heart of the Botnica. Ilpo wants to its motors and is lover of detail with them. Once in a while it flatters to them not with flowers, but with gotitas of oil here and a small adjustment of pressure there. Mimar the Caterpillar which they help to generate current for the propulsion of the helices is the commitment of Ilpo. While it was smoked a cigarette in the room of Ilpo smokers caressed its perfect mostacho and it spoke to me of when it was working in Mexico. For many of which they were there, the country captivated to them, and learned to love the siesta.
"In Finland people eat in ten minutes and return to work", assures while she squashes the butt of the cigarette in the ash tray. The companion of Ilpo, Kyostila Thymus tightens a nut in a piece and in the winch he prepares another one. In the walls of the wonderful and enviable factory filled with tools, they watch the movements of Thymus, several photos of beautiful girls of the Play-Boy and Penthouse. Once in a while a miradita of complicity is shown by the tip of the eye of these men of sea who spend the day down between the noises of the motors there and that maintain the beats of the heart of the Botnica in their right point.

They would be the 4 pm and was writing in my laptop in the bridge, in the chair of the second official. The Botnica was stopped, outside the time was barren, as soon as it made snow-white and the temperature of 2 Cs. The forecasts were at?picas for this time of the year. "I felt a dry and strong blow that threw to me against an oil pipe of the motor. Empez? to bleed by the head and v? in the single mirror that er a superficial cut, nothing important. I covered the wound with a cloth with something d egrasa mismoq ue moments before served to remove me to him algod and brightness to a cover of valves and I saw to Pepi?o, my second, wire drawing in the ground, unconscious, as I could I approached until him and with a hand in the wound and the other taking hold to me to which I could I shouted Pepe, Pepe, it wakes up, something has happened? And means little by little stunned my fellow began to rise and that cheered to me, I offed-hook telephones inner and tried to speak with the bridge, needed to know that demons had happened and which was the situation.

-Bridge, bridge, here machines, what happen?, what has been that? I asked time and time again, without obtaining answer.

The Perkins did not seem to be damaged, had jumped the automatic stop and it stayed to the slow motion. My head hurt much to me and behind me I felt as the foreman called to me from one of the corridors;

-Moncho, moncho, we have a water route, I need aid.

Of cover they lowered others and those that slept being old guard did not understand anything, until the inner radio sounded: we have hit against the ice and is a water route by starboard, d?ganme how it is the situation there down. it has wounded? the second official said. I am going to send a distress signal.
Fucking old man, I said aloud, to good site you have not taken and in worse place we have to die frozen? you and your fears and your problems.

But also I understood that there down there was much to do mainly and that it had to help the possible wounded companions. The second oificial returned to communicate and in this occasion it said: To all the crew: this is the situation, we are catched in an ice bank and there is no way to continue. The captain needs an urgent evaluation the damages and the machine. The Perkinson cannot more, and the best thing is to maintain it in 60 rpm not to damage the transmission, we do not know.
Later I knew that the captain was resting in his stateroom, the blow also had surprised to him him.

Sunday 15 of February 2004 15.00pm
Operating bridge of the Botnica.
It is Sunday and to the entrance of the port of Rauma the Botnica rests between of an ice sea. By stern I can far see the city of Rauma and the chimneys of several factories vomiting water steam that are based with low clouds.
Our ship cleaned very early and early morning the entrance to the port, when it attended the Helga position. The silence of the bridge is broken with the voice by the radio of VHF of the official of a ship asking about the conditions of the ice in the sea.
-How you see this Juha? I ask to him, "is no necessity to mobilize to us, the ice does not have too much thickness and would be a cost would be an unnecessary cost".
Moving slowly  as small beetle sails a small Pilot of color orange to the encounter of the ship. "those can" indicates Juha yet  itself.

It is Sunday and the sun shows timid by the horizon, my stomach well is taken care of and in my left hand a cup of smoky coffee little by little helps me to wake up to me. "This winter is arriving warmed up" says Thymus of guard from the six in the morning, "the normal thing is that to this height of the year the temperature oscillates between -10 to -20 ?C

I continue writing seeing the bay of Rauma through one of the great windows of the bridge. There is tranquillity here above, me would make rich locking up it in small bottles of crystal and selling it, but the calmness is not sold, single it obtains when the spirit and the soul of each one agree themselves. Why some confused gull crosses the fast Botnica and I think that would like to be gull to see I the world fromabove and flying and flying and to cross the seas, an unattainable dream. From this watchtower in the operating bridge of the Botnica and by prow a beautiful ice landscape is descried that is lost in the horizon. It is Sunday and in the ground floor of the ship it is the gymnasium with clients who to that hour burn fat. Others take advantage of the oporrtunidad a calm day and a sea with little traffic. The day is transformed to this, to the meals, coffees and to a Jason tugboat that clean of ice the passage to a position with containers. Several men plugged a great orifice in the iron helmet, by where frozen water entered the two and motobombas did not give supply removing it. We feared the worse thing, to list to a side and landslide of load. "Give me your position" asked of the icebreakers and the captain whom it had defied to the time, and those of the icebreakers days back, it loosen with one hoarse and brief word the place. It was another badly day for him, knew it perfectly and single it was the culprit of loq ue could happen, knew there that its life had to remain in the sea and that it had to pay by that shipwreck. "These are the meterorological forecasts for the next days" said by the radio those of the icebreakers. Snow-covered forts of the West with wind gusts of wind from 80 to 100 km-hour and possible movement of icy patches. We will not arrive more until its position in five days or depending on badly that we find the trip. Take precautions ". Received, the captain said, and of followed he went to his stateroom leaving to the ship in charge of first.

During several hours it looked for and it read about danger in ice sea, precautions and consequences. They had food and fuel for two weeks, mainly to feed the diesel engine and generators on the second auxiliary motor. "Which they are not stopped at any moment" it said the second. "dadles what they request". The old sailor counted all this fight to his memories not without showing in his interior the fear that happened until those of the icebreakers arrived. They were seven days put there, in a boat that began to list itself by the pressure of the icy patches moved by the wind and the weight of the snow on cover. "We had to leave one, two or three times per day and during the night to clean the accumulated snow" it said the old one with difficult voice and the pain in the fingers was immense, some underwent freezing and amputations. When they arrived our rescuers found a spent crew, a captain on the brink of madness suicide and to a ship on the verge of being swallowed by the ice and the sea.
They took care of to us with blankets, but as soon as we understood them, and little by little they opened a route until Oulu. We took other three days in arriving. Part of fu?mos us taken to the hospital
I gave thanks to the old Perkins for its effort and I did not want to know nothing else of that stupid idiot captain. I believe that a year committed suicide later ". In the navigation chart table the Juha (they captain and senior officers) discusses on the course to follow. "We received as much metereol?gica information that" really we are like a police of the sea and in our hands is suggesting to them to the captains whom do not leave the port and which they wait for hours. Of course we cannot prevent that they do not do?solo in case of extreme danger -, and in general usually they listen to us. There are professionals in the sea and also there are them do not disregard our suggestions.
The wind in winter and a sea on the feet becomes very dangerous because it acts with much pressure on the helmet of the boat, specially in the one of those of small tonnage. To sail in waters of the Baltic Sea or the gulf of Botnia in winter is single for experts and in fact "every year situations in which appear tenemo

To sail in waters of the Baltic Sea or the gulf of Botnia in winter is single for experts and in fact "every year situations appear in which we must go very fit in the very fast time and, since we want it or not always there is some boat to which the helmet is damaged to him or the helix by the ice and taambi?n is normal that two or three boats have problems at the same time and they remain catched in the ice during days or one week".
On the matter, Joha Varis always thinks about positive, and it has it to do by many reasons, one for them is that "we know where it is the boat, his position, and telephone, but the problem appears when the helmet begins to be damaged by the pressure of the ice and so much is its force and power that can raise it of the water and list it" (in small boats) In 1975 one began to work with the icebreakers in the north of the gulf of Bothnia, although first it began in 1890. In winter the north of the gulf of Botnia was closed to the marine traffic, but when existing in that zone many factories of paper it was not left more remedy than to open to routes of entrance and exit to the sea between the ice, after many studies for his ports.

This winter is hot and the ice melts by the high temperature (2 ?C) For example the last year was very cold, very cold. Invier to us during the pasts 100 years are hotter. We cannot guess evidently like can be to invier to us and the only thing that corresponds to us is to have always ready the crews and the boats. Some times there are collisions when the ice is very strong and we are breaking ice and opening a route on watch. The icebreakers for and the one that precedes to him not give time him and hit the stern.

"When the channels of entrance and exit are very little deep the airmiss is garnde. Both captains must be very pending of the maneuvers and the officials helping him. The icebreakers need space, time and a speed to break the ice, to open a route. If the boats sail closely together of icebreaker a collision by the stern is inevitable. That has happened to me more of once. It is very important that they hope to that we lay the way. Soon it is the problem of the wind that moves the ice. It seems a triviality but a wind acting on an immense mass of ice makes move it in just a short time. It is a true danger for the small boats ".

Snow storms fear, fears "you cannot see nothing" says Christian."is very difficult to see, you cannot see through the windows, and more of once we must say to him to the position that we must stop. He is very dangerous. He is preferable to hope to that the time improves. The positions are not happy evidently, and ask when, when, when? it is normal, we must think that we cannot risk to us too much. Attempt that Juha removes its more human side, its part of man and sailor that knows the sea, to which has respect to him as it is logical, wanted that with the hand in the heart it spoke me of his fears, of his fears, because I know other sailors and the majority never speaks of that.
Those that they cross the Cape Horn or the Strait of Magellan, those that with other companions underwent some who another storm, is extremely difficult to take at least one line to them, a word that speaks of its fear in the sea. Pensativo, relaxes in the chair and stretches the legs, puts the hands in the pockets of its jeans and fixes its glance somewhere.
"No, it is not fear which can be felt, but I have observed more of once nervous people in the bridge, and clear that it is a fear, or something similar, because it is a responsibility degree, and about seconds I have thought by me, and them", I assume that by your family, by those of the others, by same you, I say to him interrupting the conversation, "if sure indeed. I trust my men and they trust me, we are equipment of professionals, of people human with many hour in sea, and if for example you are tired because the hours that you take already in the bridge have exceeded you must unavoidably let to the bridge and irte to sleep, to rest for a moment ". After saying this Thymus to me, that he is very kind to the conversation and imprimiendo a map of Rauma, it says: you lost photos the week last with a spectacle of Aurora borealis in the sky, something abnormal by these latitudes".
It is the sea and in him it is the life and its surprises.

"Some times the captains do not do case to us and take the most direct way, to save time and fuel (they create) says to Christian (second official) and soon they call to us so that we attend to them because they were catched in the ice in some. Thinking with the head in low position, Christian joins the hands and it sees me the eyes with force: "and what we can it makes or say to them if then we are to hundreds of miles of its problem. Or would like us to be able to say to him that although or we noticed it previously and she did not make case now we have behind us to five, eight or twenty ships to which we are opening a route to them, and evidently cannot leave them single, to attend a very concrete request.
In the sea there are noticeable specific routes in the letters that all navigator knows, and through those routes that they give access to the most important ports of the Swedish and Finnish coast (they have an agreement of cooperation with Sweden) happens to newspaper, depending on meteorology, or two icebreakers. The routes that are as the airways in the sky cross the two coasts and in each important port it has to icebreaker ". But for all the north of the gulf of Botnia it is a hot potato. "There if that does bad weather and you can be found with ice of until of two meters, although every winter is different, and the one of the previous year is never repeated, can that. They are the black ewes of between hundreds of captains who have chosen a route that we with our experience have indicated to them.
All the captains wish to save money because the companies give incentives them to save in diesel engine and time. But that brings bad consequences. The captains of the icebreakers organize in special cases like attending and reorganizing the traffic in the zone of the Gulf of Botnia.

Monday 16 of February Leaving the Botnica 05,00
Christian took me room to its and it flattered to me with a Finnish video of icebreakers that diverse foreign televisions made. Christian has a daughter, it likes the photography and mainly to make friends. One melody of the Nokia woke up me to 04.30. Jarmo, chef, prepared the breakfast for the salient crew and the entrant. I took leave of him and it flattered to me with a slice of bread soaked in something flavorful that prepared then. I felt like in house, when my mother dismisses me for a long trip, always with a pretty smile, and a good ready breakfast.
I look around the four corners of that kitchen and promised to return. Hardly they had been three days and it felt it and already it appreciated like mine, as if there was been in that place all the life. I raised the bridge and I took leave of which was on duty: Roy, Juha and Juha captain.
There were not many commentaries, the sailors are not of many words in the goodbyes, and I understand it, because whenever leaves to the sea everything cannot take with them what to his around it is life, would be like a punishment, From earth I remained quiet listening to the noise of azipod electrical. I saluted to the bridge and I walked on the slippery ice of the port in the direction of the city. I returned to turn the head and I saew as the Botnica were lost at night quiet in the darkness. Meters further on an automobile was stopped to my height and it asked to me if it went to the city, Raimond, a man of about 65 years old, he approached to me until the bus-station. What happens in this city where people is like in my earth? Juha, the captain lives in Rauma with its family, like many other sailors, but will not return to see it until within three weeks. This is land of the Botnica that was born here under the watched letter of one of its parents, Athi engineer, and here also this history finishes, to my grief of course, writing in the bus that takes to me until the port of Helsinki.

Half year isolated by the ice the winter from the parallel 60?N becomes a nightmare for many ships that need to arrive until the ports with the merchandise. "More of 80 % of the merchandise that arrive at Finland it does by sea. For the boats this way becomes unbearable given to the meteorological conditions of the Gulf of Finland and the Gulf of Botnia. In order to open to ways in the thick and hard ice the Maritime Finnish Administration it has developed from the year a 1890 network of ships icebreakers considered like of most important of the world.
Twenty-three of approximately the 60 Finnish commercial ports are open to the traffic throughout the year. During the months of winter, these 23 ports are visited by than 9000 ships transporting more more than 27 million tons of merchandise. The boats are attended by nine icebreakers generating more than 120 megawatts of power, sufficient to maintain the expeditious routes of transport during all the winter.
During a normal winter these icebreakers operate for more than 1000 days and cross 140,000 miles marine. Also they tow to boats Normally the operational season is from mid November until end of May. By the fact that icebreakers maintains these open routes all the year the UE has classified to the Finnish routes of sea like a part of their trans-European chain of transport. Freezing waters the freezing of the sea Baltico in winter causes that most of the Finnish ports they are closed of natural form.
The purchase in 1890 of the first one icebreaker, of Mortaja name (in english to breaker) opened to a new chapter in the fight against the conditions of the duro winter. This made possible that Finland opened a new stage of its life against the isolated Through the Finland years it began to construct his own boats and one specialized in the techniques. The operational attendance is beautifully simple, in addition to heroic.

As the icebreakers break the ice
The ice is broken when the ship develops speed and with its own weight and the form of the prow del helmet yields before the pressure. The own form and design of the icebreakers cause that the ice pieces are expelled towards the sides. The propellers are fed on electrical energy that produce the different generators helped by motors to caterpillar of diesel engine and are adjustable in a radius of 360? (azipod). The icebreakers as soon as it generates noises and their energy are cleaner than any other boat of fuel-diesel engine.
Shifts and teams In this boat the work guards are distributed in turns of six hours, with a captain to the control and his different officials who help in the control and the government him of the ship, in addition to the different departments from engineers, mechanics, or sailors of cover. The attendance in the sea is of 24 hours, from approximately November to April, that is when the ice melts. Also it depends much on the winter, the cold, the snow and the wind.
From 5,30 to 6,30 the breakfast, abundant be served like each food. It is like being in house of your parents and your mother cooking. Half an hour before the incoming turn to 6 and until average after the projection. The meals that are varied and different from a day from another one prepare Jarmo Sotka, professional cook, helped by Jani Reinikainien. In the cafeteria that remains always open are coffee and tea, fruit, and desserts, in addition to juices and a refrigerator filled with cheese, and other foods that can be eaten to any hour. In the Botnica it is impossible to pass hunger "whenever return to house I have excess of kilos" assures Jarmo. In order to burn them or burned they have a gymnasium with several apparatuses to make musculaci?n or bicycle.
Also there are them practice boxing. Sauna was in repair but they have another one in another floor. Sauna for the Finns is as sagrada as the siesta for the Latins, and of this last one they learned something in his stay in Mexico, or but that asks it those of machines. The FMA the Maritime Finnish Administration (FMA) has 9 icebreakers at the present time: Nordica, Fennica, Otso, Botnica, Kontio, Sisu, Urho, Apu,