After repairs were finished she was homeported in Baltimore, Maryland and used for icebreaking. "Edisto"s final cruise was a three-phase "Arctic East Summer" (AES) voyage that commenced at Baltimore on July 7, 1974. She first sailed in support of the International Ice Patrol, studying some 35 icebergs of varying sizes and shapes off the west coast of Greenland and the east coast of Baffin Island, Canada. Her crew took aerial, surface, and sonar measurements of bergs to be used by marine scientists to determine their rates of deterioration and drift. As tribute to their wives, some of the crew named the icebergs under study after their loved ones. During the voyage north, "Edisto" assisted , a cargo ship that sustained ice damage to her hull off Hamilton Inlet, Labrador.