Vessel caravan stuck near Chukotka tries to escape
The caravan of two cargo ships and two icebreakers will try to get out to the East Siberian Sea without air support.
Due to the wind direction changes the ice compression near Ayon Island (Chukotka) has stopped. The captain of the icebreaker "Admiral Makarov" decided to find the way without air support.
The flight of the helicopter Mi-8 from Anadyr was to help in piloting the vessels to get out to the East Siberian Sea.
The caravan of two dry cargo vessels (The Johann Mahmastal and The Sinegorsk) escorted by two icebreakers (The Kapitan Dranitsyn and The Admiral Makarov) could not depart from Pevek in Chukotka due to a complicated ice situation, which is measured 10 by a ten-point scale. The ice thickness near the East Siberian Sea by the Shelagsky Cape, the northernmost point of Chukotka, is more than one meter, and ice hummocks are 2.5 meters.
Ayon Island is located 30 km from the town of Pevek. According to Rosmorport press-center, the caravan may continue the route to the Bering Sea and further to Vladivostok instead of Arkhangelsk.
The caravan had arrived in Pevek from Arkhangelsk along the Northern Sea Route in early January and delivered to that Arctic region the materials for construction of a pier for the Akademic Lomonosov floating nuclear power plant (FNPP).
The power plant will be delivered to Chukotka for further mounting in 2018.
The East Siberian Sea is the most icy of all the Russian seas in the Arctic. It is fully coated with ice from October-November to June-July.
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