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Sunken floating dock PD-50 in Murmansk will be recovered

The PD-50. one of the largest floating docks worldwide and biggest in Russia, sank on October 30

© Lev Fedoseev/TASS

MOSCOW, November 19. /TASS/. The floating dock PD-50, which sank in Murmansk two weeks ago, will be recovered, Industry and Trade Minister Denis Manturov said on the sidelines of the forum Anticounterfeiting-2018 forum on Monday.

"Surely it will be recovered. Otherwise, access to the harbor of the 82nd shipbuilding plant will be upset. It remains to be seen how and when that will be done. A team of divers is currently at work there. They are to cut out a piece of metal to be examined for metal fatigue," Manturov said.

The floating dock PD-50 sank on October 30 in Murmansk while the heavy aircraft carrying cruiser The Admiral Kuznetsov (Russia’s only ship of this type) was pulled out of it in a routine procedure. The ship’s flight deck is said to have been damaged by a falling crane. Currently it is at the 35th ship repair plant. Four men were injured in the incident. One of them died later. One is missing.

PD-50 is one of the largest floating docks in the world and the biggest in Russia. It was built in Sweden in 1980 for the Soviet Navy. The dock is 330 meters long and 67 meters wide and can carry a load of 80,000 tonnes. In area the dock measures 22.1 kilometers, which is only a little less than Moscow’s Red Square.

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