Back to Beauharnois

With the buoys finally completed, we got sent back to Beauharnois to concentrate on assisting ships in the ice of the Canal. On our way through the American Locks we encountered some visitors who didn't trust the brash ice left in the track between the locks.

Ships normally meet in the channel between the locks but, with the ice there is only one way traffic. Getting between the locks in ice is pretty easy as there is only one way the ship can go though it makes it harder for the larger ships to get their bows into the locks without pushing ice in there, as well.

Beauharnois Canal usually doesn't have a problem with ice in December because it is held up on Lake St. Francis by an ice boom but the unusually cold weather has made a lot of ice. At the lower end of the canal are the two Beauharnois Locks with the Generating Station to the south of them protected by ice booms along the Canal outside the channel. Once ice gets into the Canal there isn't anywhere for it to go but towards the locks due to the current. Ships waiting for the lock will sometimes get stuck in the track as the ice freezes around them. Then, we have to break a relief track beside them to loosen the ice so the ship can move ahead.

Ice slows every operation down with the tight clearances between ships and locks. Ships waiting their turn are sometimes told to stop in the ice at the nearest anchorage until there is an opening. Of course, they get frozen into the ice, as well, and often need to be broken free to get moving.