The Canadian Coast Guard has taken delivery of CCGS Jean Goodwill, the second of three former offshore support vessels to join the fleet after completing refit and conversion work at Davie Shipbuilding in Lévis, Quebec.
The conversion work and refit completed on the 94-meter CCGS Jean Goodwill included enhancing icebreaking capabilities and endurance, upgrading the propulsion control system, navigation and communication electronics, improvements to the galley and increased crew accommodation capacity.
The coast guard is receiving the icebreakers under a C$610 million contract for the acquisition of three icebreakers from August 2018.
The first of the three icebreakers, CCGS Captain Molly Kool, entered into service in late 2018. The third icebreaker, CCGS Vincent Massey, is expected to join the fleet in 2021.
The three former Norwegian harsh-environment offshore support vessels are expected to provide 15 to 20 years of service and will be part of the national Coast Guard fleet which carries out icebreaking duties in Atlantic Canada, the St. Lawrence and the Great Lakes during the winter, and in the Arctic during the summer. In addition to icebreaking, the vessels will support other Coast Guard programs, such as search and rescue and environmental response.
The converted ships will support icebreaking operations while new ships are being built and the existing fleet undergoes repairs and planned maintenance periods.
CCGS Jean Goodwill is named in honor of the late Jean Goodwill, an Officer of the Order of Canada. Goodwill was a Cree nurse from the community of Little Pine Nation in Saskatchewan who in 1954, became Saskatchewan’s first Indigenous woman to finish a nursing program. CCGS Jean Goodwill will be homeported in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia.
