U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Healy

September 5, 2015. U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Healy arrives at the North Pole.

First U.S. ship to reach the pole unaccompanied, which implies that other U.S. ships have been there before. Since you would need an ice-breaker to reach the North Pole on the surface, that kind of implies that we went in the company of some other country's ice breaker. That wouldn't have been Russia, would it?

Healy? Where'd they get that name? Wikipedia, as usual, provides the story:

Healy was . . .named in honor of United States Revenue Cutter Service Captain Michael A. Healy (1839 – 1904) . Healy patrolled the 20,000 miles (32,000 km) of Alaskan coastline for more than 20 years, . . After commercial fishing had depleted the whale and seal populations, his assistance with introduction of Siberian reindeer helped prevent starvation among the native Alaskans.

I am beginning to suspect that we (as in we - the human race) won't be happy until we have killed and eaten every critter on the planet. And then we'll be sad.

Healy has a web cam. They put up a new pic every hour. Update May 2024 web cam is dead.

Inspired by Lloyd.