It took four days to load the starboard and port side metal / water shielding tanks
Loading of two heavy metal water shield tanks (MV3) onto the 22220-series nuclear-powered icebreaker Yakutia under construction at Baltic Shipyard (Baltiysky Zavod, part of USC), has been completed safely. Lifting and installation in the design position was carried out with a special modular system, the shipbuilding company said.
“The shipyard's specialists had to raise two 250-tonne structures to a height of nearly 20 meters and install them on board the vessel. It took four days to load the starboard and port side tanks,” the Baltic Shipyard press release said.
The MV3 shielding tanks were manufactured by the special power engineering department of the Baltic Shipyard. The tanks are constituent parts of the foundations for the ship’s reactor installations, designed to remove heat from the equipment of the reactor, to weaken the ionizing radiation of the core of a nuclear reactor and protect the crew.
A keel-laying ceremony for icebreaker Yakutia was held May 2020. This is the fourth in a series Project 22220 the nuclear-powered multipurpose icebreakers. The vessel launching ceremony was slated for the next year with delivery scheduled for the end of 2024.
The icebreaker Yakutia is being built for Atomflot (Rosatom State Corporation) and will operate in the Arctic waters.
Key particulars of Project 22220: capacity - 60 MW, operational speed - 22 knots (clean water), LOA - 173.3 m (160 m, DWL), beam - 34 m (33 m, DWL), height - 52 m; draft (DWL) - 10.5 m; minimum draft - 8.65 m, maximum icebreaking capability - 2.8-meter-thick ice (at full capacity and speed of 1.5-2 knots); full displacement – 33,540 tonnes; designated service life - 40 years, crew - 53.
The icebreaker will be powered by a pair RITM-200 reactors of 175 MW. The new generation system was developed specially for this ship. The vessels dual-draft concept and capability will allow operating them both in the Arctic and in the mouths of the polar rivers.
The icebreakers designed by naval architecture and marine engineering firm CDB Iceberg in 2009 will be operated in the western region of the Arctic: in the Barents, Pechora and Kara Seas, as well as in shallower areas of the Yenisei estuary and the Ob Bay area.
Aleksey Kadilov, General Director of Baltiysky Zavod previously said the shipyard could reduce the construction time of LK-60 ships from 6 to 4.5 years due to production modernization. Three more 22220 series icebreakers (Sibir, Ural and Chukotka) are currenlty in various stages of readiness at Baltic Shipyard.
Saint-Petersburg, Russia based Baltiysky Zavod Shipyard (Baltic Shipyard) was established in 1856 and today is a 100% subsidiary of the state-owned conglomerate United Shipbuilding Corporation (USC), established by order of the Russian Government. The shipyard specializes in the construction of Rank 1 surface crafts, ice class vessels with nuclear and diesel-electric propulsion, of nuclear floating energy units and floating distilling plants. Baltic Shipyard has built over 600 ships and vessels. The shipyard employs more than 6,000 people.