Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, Ltd. has announced that from 27 – 28 March the first loading operation of the ice-breaking LNG carrier Vladimir Rusanov, jointly ordered by MOL and China COSCO Shipping Corporation Ltd., was conducted in the Yamal LNG plant at Sabetta port.
The vessel is the first of three newbuilding vessels for MOL and China COSCO Shipping's fleets in the Yamal LNG Project, announced in July 2014, and will sail under a long-term charter contract to transport LNG for the Yamal LNG Project.
The vessel left the Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co., Ltd. (DSME) Okpo yard, after her naming ceremony on 21 December 2017, and headed to the Arctic Ocean through the Suez Canal for Ice trials. The ice trials took place over three weeks in the presence of MOL's technical engineers and marine experts; her charterer Yamal LNG; her builder DSME; and the manufacturers of her main equipment. The vessel was handed over to the Yamal LNG project after the completion of the ice trials test of the vessel's independent icebreaking capabilities in the Arctic Ocean.
Constructions of the second and the third vessels for MOL and China COSCO Shipping, at the Okpo yard of DSME, have been progressing as originally planned. They will be delivered to the Yamal LNG project when their construction is completed at the end of September 2018 and September 2019 respectively.