UK sanctions halt highly needed floating repair dock for nuclear icebreaker fleet
The new 220-meter dock built in Turkey is now stranded in the Mediterranean after London two weeks ago sanctioned the tug boat meant to tow it to Murmansk.
Russia has no floating dock in the Arctic big enough to lift the four newest nuclear-powered icebreakers of the Project 22220. Consequently, the Arktika, Sibir, Ural and Yakutiya are forced to sail all around Scandinavia to the Baltic shipyard in St. Petersburg to do hull-repair work.
The only giant floating dock Russia had in the north sank in 2018 at shipyard No. 82 north of Murmansk while it was serving the aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov.
Rosatomflot, the operator of the nuclear icebreaker fleet, signed a $68 million contract with Turkish Kuzey Star Shipyard in 2021 to built a new dock big enough to serve the new class of icebreakers. The dock, which has a lifting capacity of 30,000 tons, was completed last fall and towed out via the Bosphorus Strait to the Mediterranean.
When the newest icebreaker, the Yakutiya, arrived to Murmansk in April, Rosatomflot director Yakov Antonov informed that the new floating repair dock would arrive to the service base on the outskirts of Murmansk in the second half of 2025.
That was before the UK decided to sanction the tug.
"UK sanctions have helped halt Putin’s plans to station a floating repair dock in the Arctic to service the precious icebreakers fleet," the Foreign Office in London said in a statement ahead of Foreign Secretary David Lammy's visit to Norway this week.
Lammy is Wednesday flying to Svalbard to meet Norway's Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide.
The sanctioned tug boat, the Russian-flagged Vengery, has now left the floating dock in the Mediterranean and is currently heading back north towards Murmansk alone, according to MarineTraffic.com
Two smaller docks
Rosatomflot today has two floating docks. One of them, the PD-3, is stationed in the port of Murmansk (top photo). It is used to dock the nuclear icebreaker 50 Let Pobedy and third-party vessels. The other dock, the PD-0002, is stationed at the icebreaker's service base just north of Murmansk and is used to dock the nuclear-powered icebreakers Yamal, Taymyr and Vaygach.
If Russia can't find another way to tow the new dock north, the Yakutiya icebreaker will later this year have to sail back to St. Petersburg for docking after her initial first season is completed.
But the Baltic shipyard has challenges with a limited number of docks for larger vessels. Russia's military navy buildup are taking up existing capacities.
Hull inspections and repair will soon be needed for the Arktika, Sibir and Ural as well.
Ukraine war
The nuclear-powered icebreakers play an important role in clearing paths along the Northern Sea Route for sanctioned oil- and LNG tankers, important for fueling Russia’s war economy.
London makes clear that the aim of the sanctions is to trouble Putin's funding of the war on Ukraine.
"Areas close to the Arctic are being used by Russia’s nuclear-powered icebreakers which are crucial to Putin’s High North ambitions, clearing paths for tankers helping fund his illegal war in Ukraine," the statement from the Foreign Office said.
It is unclear what alternatives Rosatomflot might find to bring its new dock north. In January, the US Department of State sanctioned the Turkish Kuzey yard for working with Rosatomflot.
Also Rosatomflot director Yakov Antonov is sanctioned. So is Vyacheslav Ruksha, Rosatom's director of the Northern Sea Route Directorate.
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