White Sea News

President Vladimir Putin on Sunday signed a new naval doctrine which cast the United States as Russia's main rival and set out Russia's global maritime ambitions for crucial areas such as the Arctic and in the Black Sea.Speaking on Russia's Navy Day in the former imperial capital of St Petersburg founded by Tsar Peter the Great, Putin praised Peter for making Russia a great sea power and increasing the global standing of the Russian state.After inspecting the navy, Putin made a short speech in which he promised that what he touted as Russia's unique Zircon hypersonic cruise missiles…

Russia said on Monday it had successfully tested a Tsirkon (Zircon) hypersonic cruise missile, a weapon President Vladimir Putin has touted as part of a new generation of missile systems without equal in the world.The defense ministry said in a statement that the missile had been fired from the Admiral Gorshkov, a warship located in the White Sea, and traveled at around seven times the speed of sound before hitting a ground target on the coastline of the Barents Sea more than…

The Beloe More recently joined its sister vessel Severnaya Dvina in the Port of Sabetta, northern Russia. The 2,000 m3 hopper dredger was delivered from stock to FSUE ROSMORPORT. The customized hopper dredger will perform maintenance duties and execute capital dredging in the newly created harbor.The Beloe More - meaning ‘White Sea’ in Russian - is not the first vessel Damen has delivered to ROSMORPORT. As Vadim Akimov, Damen Sales Director, explains : “ROSMORPORT is the Russian enterprise responsible for the accessibility of all major Russian sea ports.

Expedition cruise ship Hanseatic has navigated the Northeast Passage for the second time, completing its journey through the Arctic Ocean sea route in the early hours of September 7, 2016. After sailing a total of 5,542 nautical miles, the ship will arrive in Nome on September 10 and officially end its cruise. In 2014, Hapag-Lloyd Cruises’ Hanseatic became the first non-Russian cruise ship to navigate the Northeast Passage, which runs along the north coasts of Asia and Europe, from the Bering Strait to the White Sea.

Russia’s PAO Sovcomflot (SCF Group) subsidiary SCF Tankers Ltd. has won an auction for nine arctic-going tankers that belonged Primorsk International Shipping Ltd. (PRISCO), who filed for chapter 11 protection in January 2016. The purchase deal is worth $215 million, and the auction results have been approved by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, which is handling PRISCO’s bankruptcy case. SCF Tankers outbid Denmark’s Hafnia Tankers Ltd., who submitted a $208 million offer, the Wall Street Journal reported. The nine ships comprise one Aframax crude oil tanker: Zaliv Amerika (104,535-dwt); three LR2 oil product tankers: Zaliv Amurskiy (104…

Under a contract with Rosneft to create a microbial medication for northern seas signed in 2014, scientists of Moscow State University’s biological faculty have identified about 100 microorganisms able to decompose oil and petroleum products at low temperatures including below zero ones. Over one year, more than 250 samples of water have been tested in Russia’s major northern ports, as well as by the shoreline of northern cities like Murmansk, Vladivostok, Petropavlovsk Kamchatsky, etc. As a result, the scientists have discovered that it had taken a long time for the microorganisms to adapt, yet now they use petroleum products as food. The study has used bacterium which adapted to oil pollution in a natural way, which is why they are totally environmentally friendly.

Wind power in the northern regions of Finland is developing most rapidly than other parts of the c Scandinavia and the Kola Peninsula. According to data collected on a statistical portal Patchwork Barents, regions of Ostrobothnia and Lapland are the undisputed leaders in the production of electricity from wind power. In another northern Swedish province - Norrbotten - is planned to place the largest wind power project to build a wind farm Markbyugden. In the northern province of Norway Nordland, Troms and Finnmark in 2014 did not show any significant changes in the volume of production of electricity from wind energy. Finnmark is the largest manufacturer in the north of Norway, with production capacity of 200 GW / h.

The research and development expedition to investigate ice and metocean conditions in the Russian arctic organized by The Arctic Research and Design Center (the Rosneft and ExxonMobil JV) with the support of Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute experts has started in the White sea. Scientific research vessel Akademik Tryoshnikov departed the Arkhangelsk port to move along the route from the Kara Sea to the Chukchee Sea, virtually along the whole of the Russian Arctic coast. The comprehensive research expedition will last for 57 days. It will involve experts of Roshydromet, All-Russian Research Institute of Geology and Mineral Resources of the World Ocean named after academician Igor Gramberg and Institute of Geography of the Russsian Academy of Sciences.

The Russia strategic nuclear-powered submarine 'Vladimir Monomakh' has left the Sevmash shipyard to start sea trials in the White Sea, reports the Barents Observer. Vladimir Monomakh is the third of a total of eight Borey-class nuclear-powered missile submarines that Russia plans to build by 2020. The submarine is 170 meters long, has a speed of 29 knots submerged, a crew of 107 and will be equipped with 16 Bulava missiles, which each can carry ten nuclear warheads. Source: Barents Observer

The sixth short-sea multi-purpose bulk carrier for North-West Shipping Co., named 'Neva Leader' has been delivered by the Nevsky Shipyard, as part of a project by Marine Engineering Bureau-Design-SPb, JSC. The tugboat RB-401 was built by Pella Shipyard for port operations in Kalingra, and to support the Russian Baltic Sea Fleet. The shipbuilder explains that multi-purpose dry-cargo vessels of deadweight more than 7000 tons RSD49 project are the largest of the existing dry-cargo vessels of the 'river-sea' type in Russia.

For as long as men have traveled and traded by water-routes, ice has been a nemesis for ships and their hulls. And with good reason since, on average, sea ice covers about 25 million square kilometers (9,652,553 square miles) of the planet—amounting to about two-and-a-half times the area of Canada. To wage ice battle, even in the earliest days of polar exploration, sailors used strengthened ships to ply icy waters. Naturally, these ships were originally wooden and based on existing designs but reinforced…

During the Italy-Russia Business Forum in Trieste, Italy, Fincantieri secured a contract to build a semi-submersible floating platform for the transportation of nuclear submarine reactor compartments. The company also signed an agreement to define plans for an advanced technology offshore energy drill-ship. Fincantieri has been contracted by RosRAO, the Federal State Unitary Enterprise for radioactive waste management, to build a semi-submersible floating platform for the transportation of nuclear submarine reactor compartments.

Russia’s first two Borey-class strategic submarines will be ultimately deployed with the Pacific Fleet says Defense Minister. The submarines Yury Dolgoruky and the Alexander Nevsky are undertaking test runs in the White Sea and are expected to be commissioned by the end of 2012. “I am absolutely certain that the first two subs will be initially placed with the Northern Fleet and will be redeployed to the Pacific Fleet after all the infrastructure there is ready,” said First Deputy Defense Minister Alexander Sukhorukov recently.

Indian Navy's aircraft carrier INS Vikramaditya (former Russian Admiral Gorshkov) will depart for the White Sea on June 8 at 2 am to start sea trials, according to  a Sevmash shipyard spokesman. The carrier's sea trials will last 120 days. If any defects are detected, the ship will stop trials and return to Sevmash to put them right. The Indian Navy was planning to begin trials of the carrier in late in May 2012. Sevmash shipyard is due to deliver the ship in Dec 2012. India agreed with Russia to purchase Admiral Gorshkov in 2004. The contract value was $1.5 bln.

Sea trials of the Admiral Gorshkov aircraft carrier being overhauled for the Indian navy at the Sevmash shipyard in northern Russia have been postponed until the beginning of June, the shipyard said. The purchase of the Soviet-built Admiral Gorshkov was agreed in 2005 but delivery to India has been long delayed. The cost of refurbishing the aircraft carrier, to be renamed INS Vikramaditya, has since gone up from $947 million to $2.3 billion. The vessel was originally scheduled…

Barents Oberver reports that the recently discovered oil spill now threatens marine life and sea birds in the White Sea, the unique Arctic waters in Russia’s northwest. The magnitude of the spill remains unknown, but environmentalists fear for the worst. Last year’s spill, which took place at the same time of year, polluted more than 210,000 square meters of waters and 400 square meters of the coastline. While the Belomorsk Oil Base in 2011 put out oil booms, it is not able to do so this year because the bay is not yet ice-free,say WWF Russia. According to Aleksey Smirnov, chairman of the Murmansk regional Committee on Environment and Nature Management, the oil leakages to the sea come from the numerous of spill which over the years have run into the adjacent land.

On the 15th of August M/T Marilee LR1 Ice Class 1A, successfully completed her first Northern Sea Route Passage, safely escorted by Rosatomflot's nuclear ice breaker Vaigach. The savings compared to a voyage through Suez were 18 days and 580 tons of bunker resulting in a significant cost benefit for the Charterer and reduced emissions. The M/T Mariann, sister vessel to Marilee, embarked mid September as the second vessel under Marinvest management, on her NSR passage for discharge in the Far East.

Furthering Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd.'s commitment to reducing their greenhouse gas footprint by one-third per available passenger cruise day by 2015, the global cruise line announced that it is partnering with Ecospec to install a pilot test of their CSNOx system on Royal Caribbean International's Independence of the Seas. The CSNOx system was introduced by Ecospec in January 2009, and is an abatement technology reported to remove sulfur dioxide (SOx), oxides of nitrogen (NOx) and carbon dioxide (CO2) from engine emissions in one process. Royal Caribbean is the first cruise operator to initiate a feasibility study with Ecospec to explore the potential for installation of CSNOx systems on a cruise ship.

The General Cargo vessel, M/V Rim is reported to have been hijacked the morning of Feb. 3 in the Gulf of Aden to the north of the Internationally Recommended Transit Corridor (IRTC). M/V Rim is not registered with MSC HOA and has had no communications with UKMTO. The Rim was in the North West area of the Gulf of Aden just south of the Yemeni coast. The Coaster is a general cargo ship of 4,800 tonnes, North Korean flagged and owned by White Sea Shipping of Libya. A coalition ship USS Porter that works closely with EU NAVFOR and a helicopter from USS Farragut, both of CMF CTF 151, confirmed that the Rim had been hijacked. There are no reports of the composition or nationalities of the M/V Rim that has now altered course and is heading towards the Somali Basin.

Companies, organisations and individuals that have championed high standards and quality in shipping issues have been honoured in the annual Seatrade Middle East and Indian Subcontinent Awards. The awards, recognising maritime safety and the environment, ship and port operations and efficiency, security and financing, were presented at a gala dinner attended by around 600 senior executives of the region’s maritime and related industries at Al Johara Ballroom, Madinat Jumeirah, Dubai, on Thursday.

Keppel Shipyard, a division of Keppel Group, has successfully converted a 155,000dwt tanker into a Floating Production Storage and Offloading Vessel (FPSO) for ProSafe. The vessel, previously known as White Sea, was named Espoir Ivoirien by Mrs Agnes Monnet, wife of the Minister of Mines and Energy, Côte d’Ivoire, at a ceremony at Keppel Shipyard this afternoon. The conversion of Espoir Ivoirien, included the construction and installation of an internal turret and the installation and integration of the complete topside equipment package. Preparatory work for the conversion began in Subic Shipyard which carried out surface treatment, repair, blasting and painting.

An explosion on a decommissioned nuclear submarine being cut up for scrap metal at a northern Russian shipyard killed at least one person and seriously injured another, an emergency official said Monday. According to the Associated Press, the blast at the Zvyozdochka plant on the White Sea took place at 8:32 a.m. aboard a submarine that had already been stripped of its nuclear fuel and reactors, said Igor Grigoriyev, a spokesman for the Emergency Situations Ministry in the Arkhangelsk region. Officials at the Defense Ministry and the Federal Atomic Energy Agency said they had no information on the incident. Shipyards officials could not be reached for comment. Russian news reports said the submarine was a Victor-class vessel that normally has two reactors on board.

tankers in the P-MAX series – was named today. be held at Brodosplit Shipyard out-side Split. from e.g. the US. company Sovcomflot. The master of the Stena President is Yashin Yuriy. together with Hans Norén, President of Concordia Maritime, and Ulf G. Ryder, President and CEO of Stena Bulk. represented by its president, Domagoj Klaric. delivered in the third quarter. in 2006, was also signed to a 10-year charter with Argo Shipping. tenth unit is planned for 2010.