''Teshio'' (PM 15) is an active deep sea

icebreaker An icebreaker is a special-purpose ship or boat designed to move and navigate through ice-covered waters, and provide safe waterways for other boats and ships. Although the term usually refers to ice-breaking ships, it may also refer to smaller ...

owned and operated by the

Japan Coast Guard The is the coast guard responsible for the protection of the Geography of Japan#Composition, topography and geography, coastline of Japan under the oversight of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism. It consists of about ...

. Classified as a medium-patrol-vessel, the ship is capable of icebreaking and

ice navigation Ice navigation is a specialist area of navigation involving the use of maritime skills to determine and monitor the position of ships in cold waters, where ice is a hazard to the safety of navigation. The presence of sea ice requires a ship to e ...

in winter waters around

Hokkaido is the list of islands of Japan by area, second-largest island of Japan and comprises the largest and northernmost prefectures of Japan, prefecture, making up its own list of regions of Japan, region. The Tsugaru Strait separates Hokkaidō fr ...

and similar seas. The ships ice resistance capability has been studied and published ice model testing made available based on sea trials.

History

The ship was built by Nippon Kokan, now part of

JFE Holdings is a corporation headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It was formed in 2002 by the merger of and and owns JFE Steel, JFE Engineering and Japan Marine United. JFE is from Japan, Fe (the chemical element symbol of iron) and Engineering. In 2020, i ...

. The ship was launched on 20 April 1995. The ship was commissioned on 19 October 1995.

Characteristics and equipment

The ship has a standard displacement of 563 tonnes, a beam of 10.6m and a length of 54.9m. The ship has a JM

M61 Vulcan The M61 Vulcan is a Hydraulic machinery, hydraulically, electrically, or pneumatics, pneumatically driven, six-Gun barrel, barrel, air-cooled, electrically fired Gatling gun, Gatling-style rotary cannon which fires 20 mm caliber, rounds at an e ...

armament and 2 marine JMA radars. She has two diesel fuel engines.

References

{{Reflist 1995 ships Icebreakers Naval ships of Japan