Radioactive incident icebreaker back in port

Russia’s river-icebreaker “Taimyr” was last Thursday reported to have a leakage of cooling water from one of the pipes in the reactor compartment. The icebreaker, at that time operating north of Dudinka in the Yenisei river, had to abort her mission and started the voyage towards the homeport in Murmansk on the coast of the Kola Peninsula.

It takes time to cool down a uranium fueled reactor that has been operating for a long winter season in Russia’s Arctic waters. Therefore the reactor reduced its power before the weekend, according to Rosatomflot, the federal operating company of the nuclear powered fleet. Likely, it was also powered down due to fear of more leakages than the 20 to 30 liters’ per day said to be the case when the detection system in the air cleaning facilities first discovered radioactive gas.

Tracked by satellites
The Norwegian coastal administration’s vessel traffic service in Vardø on Norway’s easternmost point to the Barents Sea has been tracking the ill-fated Russian icebreaker since the radioactive incident was reported by BarentsObserver last week. Satellite plots from Vardø showed that “Taimyr” was assisted by another of Russia’s nuclear powered icebreakers trough the ice-covered Kara Sea. The icebreaker “Rossia” escorted “Taimyr” into the Dolgoya Bay on Vaigach island on Friday evening. Other sources that have been tracking the icebreakers with the help of the same satellite survilance system as the Norwegian coastal administration uses, says to BarentsObserver that the icebreakers for one or another reason stayed in Dolgoya Bay for 24 hours, before again started to sail towards Murmansk, now with reduced speed crossing the Barents Sea.

In the eastern part of the Barents Sea, “Taimyr” and its escorting “Rossia” icebreaker were met by “Yamal”, a third of Russia’s nuclear powered icebreakers. “Yamal” come up from the White Sea and took over for “Rossia” that turned around and sailed towards the Kara Sea again.

With reduced power on the reactors and the diesel engines running, “Taimyr” sailed into the Kola bay last night.

Little offical information
Since its initial press-release last Thursday and updated on Friday, Rosatomflot has not issues one single statement regarding the radioactive leak, the fate of the cooling pipe, or any other information about the incident. Local media in Murmansk, do however report that Atomflot will hold a press-conferance later on Wednesday regarding the situation with the nuclear powered icebreaker.

In the mean-time, the incident with “Taimyr” has got world-wide media coverage and the Norwegian Radiation Protection Authorities has even issued a statement where it says that they follow the situation.

Local environmental and radiation experts in Murmansk are also concerned: -Today its micro-cracks, tomorrow it could be something more serious, says director of Bellona Murmansk Andrey Zolotkov commenting on the cracks in the cooling pipes leading to the small increase in levels of radioactivity in the air-ventilation system of the reactor compartment on the “Taimyr” icebreaker.

Prolonged operation in question
- Now we need to examine how reasonable it is to prolong the operational periods of (such) reactors, says Zolotkov. “Taimyr” was built in Finland in the late 80ies and is today 23 years old.

According to Bellona, this is the second leak in the cooling system discovered on “Taimyr” – a similar leakage was discovered a year ago also. Some few years ago, such leak was also discovered in the cooling system of the icebreaker “Arktika” – Russia’s first nuclear powered icebreaker to sail to the North Pole.

Nuclear port since 1959
RTP Atomflot, where “Taimyr” now is at port, is located in the very northern part of Murmansk city, the largest city north of the Arctic Circle with 309,000 inhabitants. The Murmanskers are used to have nuclear powered vessels near their flats. All since the Soviet Union launched its first nuclear powered icebreaker “Lenin” back in 1959, such vessels have been based in Murmansk.

Also, many of the Northern fleet’s nuclear powered submarines have earlier been at repair in the docks of naval yard No. 35 – also named Sevmorput – in the northern part of Murmansk harbor. Further north on the Kola Peninsula coast, the Northern fleet still has several bases for nuclear powered submarines and some few yards for repairing.

A public information sign down-town Murmansk informs the locals every day about temperature, wind-direction, air-humidity and, yes, about today’s levels of background radiation!

Likely no problem for the Northern Sea Route
The repair work in the reactor compartment’s cooling system onboard “Taimyr” will start as soon as the reactor is cooled down. So far, nothing is said on how long time this work will take.

However long it takes to repair the leak in the cooling pipes, the lack of “Taimyr” in operation will likely have no implications for this season’s sailing along the Northern Sea Route. Rosatomflot has one sister-vessel similar to “Taimyr” – the “Vaigach” with same capabilities to break ice in shallow waters. Also more powerful icebreakers, like “Rossia”, “Yamal”, “50 years of Vicotry”, and “Sovyetsky Souz” will assure enough ice-breaker capacity for the season.