re: #1 Flounder

Nicknames for the Polar Star from wiki:

It is four times longer than the Aurora Australis, so hopefully they will accomplish their mission.

The Polar Star just got an over $600 million stem to stern refit over the last year in drydock. It is rated to break ice up to 23 feet thick and is used to clear a channel to the McMurdo Antarctic station every year so that supply ships can deliver goods there. The Ice around the Russian ship and the Chinese icebreaker is only about half that thick so it should not be a major problem (barring mechanical difficulties) for the Polar Star to release them.

It was already headed to McMurdo station to clear a channel for the annual Antarctic summer supply convoy anyway. A few days back an article said that if its help was requested by the Australians it would still take about a week for the ship to arrive onsite (fast it isn’t).