• Age: 14
• Grade: 9

In late 1942, Britain was desperate to win the ongoing Battle of the Atlantic. German U-boats had sunk hundreds of Allied ships containing millions of tons of cargo that was needed to continue the war effort. Prime Minister Churchill had to find a solution to the carnage or the Nazis would be victorious. With the support of Churchill and Lord Louis Mountbatten, eccentric inventor and amateur spy Geoffrey Pyke proposed a dramatic project to build invincible ships of ice—massive, unsinkable aircraft carriers that would roam the mid-Atlantic servicing fighter planes and bombers on missions to protect shipping from predatory U-boat wolf packs.

This is the fascinating story of the rise and fall of Project Habbakuk and how an outlandish inventor, the British Navy, the National Research Council of Canada and a workforce of conscientious objectors tested the bizarre concept in the Canadian Rocky Mountains, far from the theatre of war.

L.D. Cross is an Ottawa writer and member of the Periodical Writers Association of Canada (PWAC). Her business and lifestyle articles have appeared in publications such as Home Business Report, Modern Woman, WeddingBells, Fifty-Five Plus, enRoute, Aviation History, and Legion Magazine. She has won awards of excellence for features and for editorial and technical writing in the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC) Ottawa EXCEL, competitions.

Cross is also co-author of Inside Outside: In Conversation with a Doctor and a Clothing Designer, which is about achieving a lifetime of feeling good and looking good.

L.D. Cross' profile page

”Author L.D. Cross, an Ottawa-based writer, has nicely captured the mood of the time and of the many characters that bring this implausible story to life. It’s an engaging read and one that lends credence to the old maxim that truth is stranger than fiction.” —Susan R. Eaton, Diver Magazine>

Code Name Habbakuk is a great story that should be shared widely because, despite the sadness and disappointment, it speaks to the human capacity to think big, aspire for the impossible, and to push back the boundaries of knowledge. —Dick Bourgeois-Doyle, author of George J. Klein: The Great Inventor

"If you are curious to learn more about Project Habbakuk, I strongly recommend L.D. Cross’s work: Code Name Habbakuk: A Secret Ship Made of Ice. The book is brief but well-written and filled with period photographs, including of the work on the ice-ship prototype at Patricia Lake."

Shawn Smallman

Code Name Habbakuk: A Secret Ship Made of Ice