After a dearth of news since it left its base on the East Coast bound for Pearl Harbor, the submarine USS Texas finally resurfaced — near the North Pole.

The 7,800-ton attack submarine, with a crew of about 134, last month completed a historic exercise in the Arctic when it became the first of the new Virginia-class submarines not only to operate in the region, but also to surface through the ice.

The 377-foot nuclear sub, commissioned in September 2006, left the East Coast in September and is en route to its new home port in Hawaii, but the Navy hasn't specified an arrival date.

It will be the second Virginia-class submarine to be stationed at Pearl Harbor after the USS Hawaii.

"Words cannot describe how impressed I am with my crew's performance and professionalism," Cmdr. Robert Roncska, the Texas' commanding officer, said of the Arctic mission.

"The ship performed extremely well in the cold under-ice environment, and I am honored to carry on the tradition of arctic operations by our awesome submarine force," Roncska added in a release by the U.S. Pacific Fleet submarine force.

The "ICEX," or ice exercise, took place in what is a remote and frigid, but increasingly contested, part of the world.

With the Arctic ice shelf receding, a region that may hold a quarter of the world's oil may someday be more accessible to shipping and exploration.

Utilization of the Arctic is contested by the United States, Russia, Denmark, Norway and Canada. Russian deep-diving submarines in 2007 dropped the national flag on the sea floor at about 14,000 feet in a symbolic claim, and British think tank Jane's Review predicted polar conflict could be a reality by about 2021.

Arctic submarine exercises often include firing unarmed torpedoes to test how they travel in the icy waters, but the Navy didn't detail its tests for the Texas.

Once surfaced, the Texas remained moored to the ice for more than 24 hours

Ens. James Robinson, the supply officer for the Texas, said in the Pacific Fleet release that on-ice activities included a re-enlistment for 12 crew members and a pinning ceremony during which one crew member received his submarine warfare qualification dolphins.

There also was some touch football in the 5-degree weather.

U.S. submarines have made a lot of trips to the Arctic — the USS Honolulu out of Pearl Harbor was the 24th Los Angeles -class sub to visit the region when it surfaced 280 miles from the North Pole in 2003.

Three polar bears thought it was quite a sight, and investigated the sub for almost two hours.