Not so long ago, explorers risked their lives and the lives of their crews in search of the fabled Northwest Passage. Now the question is no longer if a route through the Arctic exists but how many ships will use the two routes now open each year along the northern coasts of Canada and Russia. Estimates for the possibility of making truly ice-free transits range from a few years to a few decades, but in the meantime, as evidenced by the hundreds of applications in 2012 and 2013 (495 successful applicants as of September 2013 to transit Russia’s Northern Sea Route, up from zero a mere five years ago), plenty of folks are willing to risk a little ice in pursuit of shorter shipping routes that were the goal of explorers since even before Lord Franklin’s famously lost expedition.
Officer of the Watch 