Rosmorport to increase icebreaking fleet in the Gulf of Finland

Rosmorport plans to deploy for operations during winter navigation 2011-2012 in the Gulf of Finland two more icebreakers, a spokeswoman for Rosmorport told PortNews.


Irina Lobkova said, citing Deputy to General Director of the company Alexander Aleshkin, that diesel-electric icebreakers Capitan Nikolaev and Captain Dranitsyn (operated by Rosmorport’s Murmansk branch) will be added to the company’s fleet in the area.


Last winter season, Rosmorport’s 13 icebreakers (including an Atomflot’s nuclear-powered ship) were busy escorting merchant ships through the ice-covered Gulf to the port of St. Petersburg, Primorsk, Vysotsk, Ust-Luga, and Vyborg.


Rosmorport is also considering the possibility to order new linear icebreakers as the Russian Government had planned to decommission old vessels.


There is an urgent need, Rosmorport said, to replace the existing small ships by icebreakers of Project 430 (“Dixon", "Mudyug", "Magadan"), which worked well in ice-bound conditions in the White Sea, the Baltic Sea and the Sea of Okhotsk.


Rosmorport will also initiate, through the Russian Transport Ministry, legal regulation of border crossing by vessels in the area of icebreakers operations (the Gulf of Finland) before the winter navigation, the spokeswoman said.
(Source:http://en.portnews.ru)