Maritime ropes producer & supplier, Lankhorst Ropes, has supplied leading Arctic vessel builder Arctech Helsinki Shipyard Inc. with steel wire towing ropes for three new icebreaking supply and emergency operations ships operating in seas off Far East Russia and the Gulf of Finland.

The emergency and rescue vessel, NB 508 Baltika, is being built for the Russian Ministry of Transport. While the NB 506 Vitus Bering and NB 507 Aleksey Chirikov, high capability multifunctional icebreaking supply vessels are for Russian shipping company Sovcomflot.

Lankhorst has supplied each of the NB 506 Vitus Bering and NB 507 Aleksey Chirikov with 1,000m of 66mm diameter steel wire rope; the ropes have a minimum breaking load (MBL) of 310Mt. The NB 508 Baltika will use 700m of 58mm diameter rope with 240Mt MBL. The steel wire ropes feature an independent wire rope core, providing greater strength and stability to the rope than a fibre core. As well as towing, the galvanised rope can also be used for multiple other offshore applications.

Challenging Conditions

Two of the vessels, NB 506 Vitus Bering and NB 507 Aleksey Chirikov, will support the Sakhalin-1 Arkutun-Dagi oil and gas field in the Sea of Okhotsk, Far East Russia. The ships’ main tasks will be to protect the oil and gas rigs from ice accumulation, provide supplies and transport crews, as well as, oil spill recovery, firefighting, ocean towing, stand-by and rescue. The ships and their equipment will have to perform in temperatures of minus 35 °C, waves up to 18 meters in height and wind speeds exceeding 140 kilometres per hour.

Of the NB 508 Baltika the Managing Director of Arctech Helsinki Shipyard, Esko Mustamäki said “Baltika should be the benchmark when developing and building innovative Arctic vessels. Lankhorst Ropes share our desire for innovation and high standards making them the ideal rope supplier for Arctech”. Once delivered the Baltika’s operations will include icebreaking, rescue and oil spill recovery in the Gulf of Finland.