Simulated Exercise Completed in the Gulf of Finland

Thought to be the first of its kind in the world, Russia, Finland and Estonia all cooperated together as part of an EU funded long term project on Gulf of Finland Maritime Safety and Marine Environment Protection Cooperation (GOFMEC) which allowed crisis response simulator training to take place simultaneously in three educational establishments. In order to achieve this, the maritime educational institutes of the aforementioned countries were equipped with latest marine and crisis management simulators from Transas’ simulation division which worth approximately $318,900. The four EU funded projects between Russia (Admiral Makarov State Maritime Academy /Training Centre), Finland (City of Kotka, South Kymenlaakso Vocational Institute and Kymenlaakso University of Applied Sciences) and Estonia (Estonian Maritime Academy) are aimed to respond to vastly increasing oil and oil products transportation in the Gulf of Finland. The project is unique due to integration of simulators into a common network for the training and cooperation of Russian, Finnish and Estonian specialists during oil spill response. The main server of the project is situated in Admiral Makarov State Maritime Academy training center. Research indicates that increases of oil and oil products transportation in the Gulf of Finland will continue to increase and it is predicted that the total amount of oil transported will exceed 200 million tons by the year 2010. Environmental protection, safety of navigation and preparation in order to quickly respond to oil spills is very important for all countries in the region. The four projects aim to unite three national Crisis Management Simulator Centers (CMSC) as one network sharing resources, whilst simultaneously training for contingency, response and clean up procedures in the same spill scenario in all three countries. Another of the projects main objectives is to harmonize oil spill related training courses as well as share training scenarios, databases and expertise.