On 3 November 2015, the ceremonial launch of construction of the lead icebreaking support vessel for Gazprom Neft Novy Port was held at Vyborg Shipyard (a corporate member of the United Shipbuilding Corporation).
The guests were greeted by Kirill Voroshilov, First Deputy General Director of the Vyborg Shipyard. He noted that “the newbuild laid down at the shipyard is a multipurpose vessel and is capable of coping with a great number of tasks while operating in heavy ice conditions. This icebreaking vessel is unique and to date it has been unrivalled on a global scale. Vyborg Shipyard returns thanks to its customer for vesting confidence, and is justifiably proud to implement this project”.
The icebreaking support vessel will be built in accordance with the cutting edge design providing maximum icebreaking capability and considerable manoeuvrability with comparatively shallow draught. The proposed concept of an icebreaking vessel with three azimuth thrusters (located by a pair in the aft and a single unit in the fore part) enables to perform operation to a maximum effect under harsh conditions of the intended navigation area. Alexander Dyukov, President of Gazprom Neft, said: “After the Novoportovskoye field commissioning, the new oil and gas province exploration will be commenced in Russia. Construction of the Yamal major oil-producing cluster requires its infrastructure development, part of which will be icebreakers being built. In its turn, the year-round transport accessibility of the region will be an added impetus to the region development."
The official ceremony was attended by Vladimir Evenko, Technical Director - Head of the Classification Directorate of Russian Maritime Register of Shipping. According to him, "the new ship is being built under RS survey. The Icebreaker8 mark in its class notation is one of the highest ice categories as per the RS classification system. This means that even in the most challenging operating period - winter navigation - the ship will be able to make its way uninterruptedly in continuous field ice up to 2 m thick and carry out its tasks efficiently”.
The vessel was named Aleksandr Sannikov in honour of late Head of Gazprom Neft Oil Refining Directorate.
Two icebreaking vessels intended to operate at the Arctic terminal of the Novoportovskoye field on the western bank of the Ob Bay (Yamal peninsula) will be built at Vyborg Shipyard against the order of Gazprom Neft. The icebreakers’ length will be 121.7 m, breadth – about 26 m, draught – 8 m, power capacity – 21.5 MW. The primary purpose of ships is escorting of tankers, assistance during mooring, loading, rescue operations, providing tugging assistance, firefighting, participation in oil spill response activities. The vessels should be capable of operating continuously under the temperature as low as -50 С. Under the contract, the vessels are to be delivered to Gazprom Neft before 2018.