The crack arrester is used for prevention of welded steel structures from brittle fracture. In the latest mammoth tankers, the welded crack arrester of high quality steel such as grade E steel is used instead of the riveted seam. In this paper, the brittle crack arresting characteristics for welded crack arrester was investigated by using large size specimens in 1, 300 mm width. Then the correlation between the characteristics in large size specimen and in standard ESSO test with temperature gradient as a substitute of double tension test was examined. From the test results, it was found that the modified gross stress-arresting temperature curves for arrested crack length of 500, 750 and 1, 000 mm, respectively, were common, and the effective crack length was approximately 250 mm which was obtained from the ESSO test or the double tension test with temperature gradient. In addition, the effect of width of arrester plate on the crack arrest in which the distribution of residual stress was taken into account, was found.