Posts Tagged ‘Magadan’

Icebreakers tour de force: Sea of Okhotsk rescue completed

January 17, 2011
en: The Russian icebreaker KRASIN breaks throu...

The Krasin: Image via Wikipedia

The rescue of the ships trapped by ice in the Sea of Okhotsk has been completed. A tour de force at temperatures as low as – 27°C by the three ice breakers, Magadan, Admiral Makarov and Krasin. The Krasin joined last and was the star of the show.

Richard North has been following and anticipating the story and a more complete description of this admirable rescue is available here.

This morning from Ria Novosti:

http://en.rian.ru/russia/20110117/162171301.html

07:04 17/01/2011The Krasin and Admiral Makarov icebreakers have managed to take the Sodruzhestvo mother fishery ship and the Bereg Nadezhdy refrigerator vessel out of thick ice in the Sea of Okhotsk, the Far Eastern Shipping Company said Monday.

“The icebreakers first towed the mother ship to a safer area, and then returned for the Bereg Nadezdy, which they took to thinner ice,” company spokeswoman Tatyana Kulikova said.

The Bereg Nadezhdy ship, the Professor Kizevetter research vessel, and the Sodruzhestvo mother fishery ship, carrying altogether over 400 people, got stuck in two-meter-thick ice in the Sea of Okhotsk on December 31. Two other ships, the Mys Yelizavety and the Anton Gurin, became trapped a few days later.

The Admiral Makarov released the Professor Kizevetter and the Mys Yelizavety vessels from the ice trap, while the Anton Gurin managed to cope on its own.

Then the operation to rescue the Bereg Nadezhdy started, but the two icebreakers changed their plans, returning to the Sodruzhestvo vessel, which was the hardest to tow due to its wide body. Towing ropes snapped soon after the start of the operation, which resumed next day.

The rescue effort has been hampered by strong winds, low visibility and shifting ice floes in the area.


Tags:, , , , ,
Posted in Engineering, Environment, Russia, Technology, Weather | 2 Comments »

Slow progress in the Sea of Okhotsk – but progress

January 15, 2011

Itar-Tass reports.

MOSCOW, January 14 (Itar-Tass) — The Admiral Makarov and Krasin icebreakers, which are leading the Sodruzhestvo mother ship out of an ice trap in the Sea of Okhotsk, have reached the drifting refrigerator ship Bereg Nadezhdy, a source at the Transport Ministry told Itar-Tass.

“The convoy of the Admiral Makarov, the Krasin and the Sodruzhestvo reached the drifting Bereg Nadezhdy at 10:30 a.m. Moscow time on Friday,” he said.

The Admiral Makarov cleared a two-mile strip in the afternoon and returned to the convoy. “The coordinating staff led by Deputy Transport Minister Viktor Olersky is analyzing weather and ice conditions for elaborating the tactics of the further operation,” the source said.

The ships need to cross the ice for meeting with the Magadan icebreaker and the Victoria tanker.

A number of ships trapped in the ice in the Sea of Okhotsk, among them the Sodruzhestvo, the Bereg Nadezhdy, the Professor Kizevetter research ship and the Mys Yelizavety trawler, asked for help on December 31, 2010. Two vessels were taken to a safe area.

It is yet unknown when the rescue of the Sodruzhestvo and the Bereg Nadezhdy may be over, as weathermen have a bad forecast for about one week.

 

Tags:, , , ,
Posted in Engineering, Environment, Russia, Technology, Weather | 1 Comment »

Rescue operation in Sea of Okhotsk begins but one icebreaker stuck in the ice…

January 5, 2011
The Russian icebreakers Admiral Makarov and Mo...

Icebreakers Admiral Makarov and Moskva: Image via Wikipedia

The icebreaker Admiral Makarov has reached its destination in the Sea of Okhotsk and the rescue operation to free the ships trapped in the ice has begun. One trawler has been escorted to safety. But there are “hummocks” in the ice which is upto 2 m thick in places. The second icebreaker Magadan is now itself stuck in the ice and the Admiral Makarov is racing to its rescue.

Itar-Tass reports:

VLADIVOSTOK, January 5 (Itar-Tass)The Admiral Makarov icebreaker that took the Mys Yelizavety to the clear waters is now moving at full tilt to help the icebreaker Magadan, which took part in the escorting effort but got stuck in the ice itself. Given that the Magadan, too, has stuck in the thick ice filling the spaces of the Sakhalin Bay, the number of ships drifting amid ice floes towards the shore has again increased to five.

A total of three ships – the Sodruzhetsvo floating factory, the Bereg Nadezhny refrigerating ship, and the Professor Kizivetter, all of them registered in the port of Vladivostok – found themselves stranded in the ice December 30. They are located at a distance of eleven to twelve nautical miles away from Sakhalin’s shore. One more ship, the Anton Gurin trawler registered in St Petersburg, joined the trapped ships January 3.

The Magadan, a port area icebreaker, has the technical characteristics largely inferior to those of the Admiral Makarov. It has a length of 88 meters and a capacity of 13,000 horse-powers. The Admiral Makarov has the length of 135 meters and the capacity for 12,000 horse-powers.

A mass of ice floes has been driven into the Sakhalin Bay by northern winds. The ice is covered with hummocks and its thickness reaches 2 meters in some spots. The total number of seamen trapped by the ice at present stands at around 500. The Sodruzhestvo floating factory has the largest crew of 340 persons.

Tags:, , , ,
Posted in Engineering, Environment, Russia, Technology, Winter | 1 Comment »

Unusually thick ice traps ships in the Sea of Okhotsk

January 3, 2011

Itar-Tass reports that the Magadan icebreaker is struggling through 2-meter-thick ice to reach stuck ships in the Sea of Okhotsk and another ice-breaker is on its way. This reports talks of 3 ships being trapped but other reports speak of 10 ships with over 600 crew being trapped.

Line icebreaker ADMIRAL MAKAROV: image fesco.ru

VLADIVOSTOK, January 2 (Itar-Tass) — The Magadan icebreaker of the Far Eastern Shipping Company is struggling its way through the two-meter-thick ice to rescue three ships stuck in the ice in the Sakhalin Bay of the Sea of Okhotsk, a spokesman for the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk sea rescue coordination center said on Sunday.

With a speed of 2.6 knots the icebreaker develops in conditions of the 10 point ice, she has to master five miles to reach the stuck ships, the spokesman said.

The Sodruzhestvo mother ship, the Professor Kizevetter research vessel and the Bereg Nadezhdy refrigerated cargo ship are trapped in the ice eleven to twelve miles off the Khabarovsk coastline. Their attempts to break free have been vain ….. According to the Sakhalin regional emergencies administration, there is no threat to the lives and health of crew members of the three ships. Of the three stuck ships, the Sodruzhestvo has the largest crew of 340 people. The ship has food reserves for 75 days.

The Admiral Makarov, the biggest icebreaker in Russia’s Far East, is also heading to join the rescue operations. She is expected to reach the Sakhalin Bay on January 4.

The BBC also carries a report also quoting Itar-Tass but their facts seem to have morphed along the way. Two metres is converted to 12 inches by the BBC calculator!!!!

map

Sea of Okhotsk: image BBC

 

Rescue efforts are under way to evacuate more than 600 crew on 10 ships trapped in ice in the Sea of Okhotsk. The ice is up to 30cm (12 inches) thick in some places, according to the Russian news agency Itar-Tass.

The temperature in the area is -22C, according to Itar-Tass, and forecasts suggest it will fall even lower.

An Itar-Tass update is here:

http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2.html?NewsID=15834220&PageNum=0

Tags:, , , ,
Posted in Engineering, Environment, Russia, Technology, Winter | 5 Comments »