MOSCOW, August 5. /TASS/. The Russian Northern Fleet’s Arctic grouping has embarked on its eighth annual deployment to the Arctic Ocean under the direction of Kola All-Arms Flotilla Commander Vice-Admiral Oleg Golubev, the Fleet’s press office reported on Monday.
"The warships and support vessels have departed from their permanent naval bases of Severomorsk and Murmansk, sailed through the Kola Bay and formed a deployment order in the Barents Sea," the press office stated.
The Fleet’s Arctic deployment involves the large anti-submarine warfare ship Vice-Admiral Kulakov, the large amphibious assault ships Alexander Otrakovsky and Kondopoga, the rescue tug Pamir, the tanker Sergei Osipov and the icebreaker Ilya Muromets, the press office specified.
Before their deployment to the sea, the amphibious assault ships embarked the military hardware of marine infantry and the Arctic motor rifle brigade. Also, the crews practiced coherence of operations in the Barents Sea several days before their deployment.
"They held a communications exercise and also drills for logistics support and the provision of assistance to a ship in distress at sea. Besides, the warships’ crews practiced the taskforce’s air, anti-submarine and anti-sabotage defense during the sea transit and in an unsafe roadstead," the press office said.
The Fleet’s Arctic deployment is set to last two months mostly in the waters of the Barents and Kara seas, Taimyr Peninsula, the Severnaya Zemlya and Novaya Zemlya archipelagos and the Franz Josef Land.
The sailors will also take part in several landings of the marine force onto rough terrain in the Arctic where drills will be held for protecting a vital industrial facility. They will practice anti-submarine defense and conduct missile and artillery fire.