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Russia’s sole aircraft carrier gets no serious damage after floating dock incident

The PD-50 floating dock sank overnight to October 30 in Murmansk

MOSCOW, November 13. /TASS/. Russia’s aircraft-carrying cruiser Admiral Kuznetsov has got no serious damage after a crane fell onto its deck when the warship was exiting the floating dock at the 82nd Ship Repair Factory, Deputy Defense Minister Alexei Krivoruchko said on Tuesday.

"Upon the warship’s arrival at the place of its repairs at the 35th Ship Repair Factory (a branch of the Zvyozdochka Ship Repair Center), a special commission started evaluating the damage. A preliminary inspection has found that the Admiral Kuznetsov did not get any substantial damage," Krivoruchko said at a conference call led by First Deputy Defense Minister Ruslan Tsalikov.

According to him, "All the measures for restoring the warship’s technical preparedness are being carried out in a planned manner and the required adjustments have already been made to the work schedule and won’t affect the timeframe of completing the works under the contract."

According to the deputy defense minister, dock crane No. 2 fell onto the deck of the aircraft-carrying cruiser Admiral Kuznetsov on October 30 when the warship was being floated out from the PD-50 floating dock, which suddenly went underwater.

Floating dock incident

The PD-50 floating dock sank overnight to October 30 in Murmansk during the planned floatout of the heavy aircraft-carrying cruiser Admiral Kuznetsov from it. According to preliminary information, the warship itself had its take-off deck damaged by the fallen crane and is now at the 35th Ship Repair Factory.

The PD-50 is one of the world’s largest floating docks and the biggest in Russia. It was built in Sweden in 1980 on order from the Soviet Navy. It is 330 meters long and 67 meters wide and has a lifting capacity of 80,000 tonnes. The floating dock has an area of 22.1 sq. km, which is slightly less than Red Square in Moscow.

According to the company’s financial statements, the 82nd Ship Repair Factory was integrated into Russian oil giant Rosneft in November 2015. Russia’s Defense Ministry currently holds a minor stake of 0.0001% in the Ship Repair Plant.

Rosneft uses the 82nd Ship Repair Factory as the base for developing a modern center of coastal logistics support for offshore projects.