of Finland, he faced severe opposition even though he even offered to accept the old and, to some people, outdated icebreaker Murtaja as part of the payment. Her rusted hull was seen as a pile of scrap, not worth the government's scarce funds, and she didn't even have a bow propeller which was seen as a crucial component of a modern icebreaker. However, several maritime professionals saw her potential and the owner of Götaverken, Hugo Hammar, even said that once finished, Hansa would outperform the largest icebreakers of Finland at that time, Sampo and Tarmo. As a result, the Finnish Board of Navigation reserved FIM 17 million for the purchase and completion of Hansa. The rebuilding of Hansa was awarded to Sandvikens Skeppsdocka och Mekaniska Verkstads Ab in Helsinki and the work began in late spring 1923. During the ten months the icebreaker spent in the shipyard she received a new bow with a bow propeller and two German steam engines with an official combined maximum output of , making her the most powerful Finnish icebreaker at that time. On 15 December 1923 she was given the name Voima, meaning "strength" in Finnish, and during the first sea trials on 6 March 1924 she turned out to be an excellent icebreaker that left a broad ice-free channel behind her. Voima had also cost considerably less than a new icebreaker with similar characteristics and performance. Career Commissioned in March 1924, Voima was usually sent to the Gulf of Bothnia where she assisted ships to the port of Vaasa until late December. As the ice conditions got worse, she moved south until, from February on, she was tasked to maintain an open channel between Finland and Sweden on the Turku-Stockholm route. In 1927, after the loss of the Finnish torpedo boat S2, Voima was used as a gunnery training ship by the Finnish Navy. As a result, she already had deck gun mounts when the Winter War began on 30 November 1939 and the icebreakers were armed against Soviet fighters. During the war Voima assisted ships in the Bothnian Sea and stayed outside major conflicts. When the Moscow Armistice was signed on 19 September 1944, Finland was ordered to pay war reparations to the Soviet Union. One of the first payments included the newest and most powerful state-owned steam-powered icebreakers. Voima was handed over along with the enormous Jääkarhu on 24 February