 "Avance" was offered to the city of Stockholm in 1907, but the Swedish buyers decided that she was too expensive and broke off the deal.Maintaining the icebreaker turned out to be more expensive than what was anticipated, and in 1909 the city of Turku purchased the majority of the shipping company's shares.In August 1914 Russia joined the First World War and the Finnish icebreakers were placed under the command of the Baltic Fleet of the Imperial Russian Navy.