Although some damage to the bergs resulted, it must be admitted that all of the means tried 

 were unsuccessful in destroying the icebergs. 



Conclusion 



Ice Patrol's attempts at iceberg demolition ended with the 1960 tests. Rather than 

 destroying icebergs, Ice Patrol adopted Tampa's May 1926 approach of monitoring dangerous 

 icebergs and warning mariners of their locations. 



This practice makes good sense for several reasons. The demolition process is expensive 

 and dangerous. Even if an iceberg could be broken into smaller pieces, the result would be more 

 icebergs. They would be smaller than the parent iceberg and thus harder for mariners to detect 

 visually or with surface radars. 



Since the conclusion of Ice Patrol's 1960 tests, there have been two periods of renewed 

 interest in iceberg destruction: the late- 1970s and the mid-1980s. In the late- 1970s, researchers 

 studied the feasibility of towing icebergs to the Middle East as a freshwater source. If the long- 

 distance towing process succeeded, the icebergs would have to be processed at their destination, 

 which would mean cutting them apart and melting them. Fragmentation by blasting, 

 electrochemical cutting, mechanical sawing, etc., were all considered. The problem that couldn't 

 be solved was preserving the iceberg during transport to the Middle East, so the processing step 

 became moot. 



On a smaller scale, iceberg processing for fresh water has been routinely practiced in 

 Newfoundland for the last several years. A company that produces vodka from iceberg water has 

 a permit from the provincial government to harvest icebergs for their water. Harvesters prefer 

 working with icebergs grounded in sheltered coves. They use a variety of methods to harvest 

 iceberg ice, the most sophisticated of which is a barge equipped with a crane that uses a grapple to 

 chip pieces off the iceberg. The pieces are then crushed and melted in storage tanks. Chain saws, 

 rifles, and cargo nets are some of the less sophisticated tools for harvesting iceberg ice on a small 

 scale. 



In the 1980s, plans for oil development on the Grand Banks spurred renewed interest in 

 iceberg destruction. This time the problem was protecting the drilling platforms and the sub- 

 bottom pipelines from being struck by icebergs. Breaking up an iceberg approaching a drill rig or 

 pipeline would reduce the mass and draft of the iceberg. Using a hot-wire system to cut the 

 iceberg was the most promising method of accomplishing this.'^ A field test conducted in 1985 

 demonstrated modest success, but the process has not become operational. For many years the oil 

 industry has used a common practice popularly known as "iceberg wrangling," which involves 

 placing a line around the iceberg and towing it out of the rig's way. 



49 



