On March 14 2015 the Kapitan Dranitsyn icebreaker set out on a voyage from Murmansk Seaport to Alexandra Land – an island of the Frantz Josef Land Archipelago.

The voyage is performed in the framework of the contract made by FSUE “Rosmorport” and JSC “Sovfracht”. The subject of the contract is provision of ice escort services to vessels carrying general cargoes to the Alexandra Land, making ice canals in the shore ice for the vessels to approach destinations at the island’s shore and to provide further safe unloading of the general cargoes to the shore ice.  

During the operation it is planned to escort about 15 vessels to the destination point and backwards. The operation will take approximately 3 months.

After the end of the works the icebreaker will return to its home seaport at Murmansk.
 
For information:

Kapitan Dranitsyn is a diesel icebreaker of KM LL3[2] AUT2 ice class with the power of 24 thous. h.p. and the tonnage of 12.3 thous. tons. It was built at the Wartsila shipyard in Finland in 1980, and complies with the requirements of the international conventions. In accordance with the class assigned to the icebreaker by the Russian Maritime Register of Shipping, it can perform icebreaking operations in ice up to 2.5 metres thick. The enterprise uses the icebreaker to provide year-round navigation in the freezing seaports of Russia, and to escort vessels in ice to the Russian seaports in the Baltic Sea.
 
The icebreaker is highly demanded by Russian and foreign companies for icebreaking assistance of different activities connected to exploration and extraction of carbon dioxides and delivery of general cargoes. For more information on the technical characteristics of the icebreaker, and on the terms and conditions of the icebreaking services provided by the Murmansk Branch, please, turn to the section “Icebreaking services of the Murmansk Branch”.