Name Kapitan Dranitsyn Completed 2 December 1980 Length 131 m Displacement 13.53 million kg | Yard number 413 Launched 1975 Weight 15,160 tons | |
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Builders Wärtsilä, Hietalahti shipyard, Finland | ||
Kapitan Dranitsyn (Russian: «Капитан Драницын») is a Russian icebreaker, built in Finland for the former Soviet Union. Since October 1995 she has been used as a research vessel by AARI. She also offers excursions in the Arctic Ocean north of Russia.
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Layout
Kapitan Dranitsyn is a conventionally propelled icebreaker built for conditions in the Northern Sea Route and the Baltic Sea. In the last few years she has been modified as a passenger vessel, with 49 outside cabins for 100 passengers. Public accommodation includes spacious lounges, bars, a heated swimming pool, gym, sauna, library and a small hospital.
Service
Icebreaker Kapitan Dranitsyn's main activity is piloting cargo ships on the Northern Sea route. She has also carried out tourist voyages to Franz Josef Land, Spitsbergen, Novaya Zemlya, and Chukotka, to Bering Strait and even to the North Pole (with the help of a nuclear-powered icebreaker). She has completed research cruises into the Barents Sea, the Bering Sea and the Arctic Ocean.
In 1996, she made the first around-the-world voyage. In the same year, the icebreaker participated in rescuing the German passenger ship MS Hanseatic, with 135 passengers aboard.
In 2000, the icebreaker made the Arctic around-the-world voyage on the route Hammerfest (Norway) – Keflavik (Iceland) – Stromfiord (Greenland) – Canadian Arctic regions – Alaska – Chukotka - Murmansk. She made research expeditions to the Laptev Sea in 2002, 2003, and 2004, to place and recover moorings in the NABOS project. In summer of 2002, the Kapitan Dranitsyn took part in shooting an advertising film for the Ford Motor Company in the Spitsbergen Archipelago.
In January 2017, the ship was trapped in ice off the coast of Pevek on the Chukchi Peninsula.
