Sibir nuclear icebreaker to be launched in St. Petersburg on September 22
© RIA Novosti. Vadim Zhernov

Sibir nuclear icebreaker to be launched in St. Petersburg on September 22

On September 22, the 170-meter-long, two-reactor icebreaker Sibir, Project 22220 will be launched at the Baltic Shipyard in St. Petersburg. Once afloat, the vessel will be completed at the shipyard's refitting pier, RIA Novosti reported. Sibir is the first serial icebreaker of Project 22220.

The icebreaker was laid down in May 2015, and it took the Baltic Shipyard two and a half years to prepare the hull for launching. Apart from the Sibir, the shipyard is building two other Project 22220 vessels: the lead ship in the series, the Arktika, and the Ural, the second ship in the series.

Multirole Project 22220 icebreakers are designed to independently escort vessels in the Arctic and in shallow sections of the Yenisei River and the Gulf of Ob, to assist other vessels, and to conduct rescue operations amidst sea-ice formations and on ice-free water.

This spring, it was decided to commission the Arktika in the first six months of 2019, and the Sibir and the Ural will be ready in 2020 and 2021, respectively. These deadlines were extended due to delayed deliveries of turbine equipment for their propulsion units.