''Moscow University'' (russian: Московский университет, translit=Moskovskiy Universitet) is a tanker, which was ordered in 1997. The ship is notable for being captured by Somali pirates on 5 May 2010 and rescued the following day by a Russian Navy

warship A warship or combatant ship is a naval ship that is built and primarily intended for naval warfare. Usually they belong to the armed forces of a state. As well as being armed, warships are designed to withstand damage and are usually faster ...

Description

''Moscow University'' was ordered in February 1997. The ship was constructed by

NKK Corporation is a corporation headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It was formed in 2002 by the merger of and and owns JFE Steel, JFE Engineering and Japan Marine United. JFE is from Japan, Fe (the chemical element symbol of iron) and Engineering. In 2020, it ...

, Tsu, Japan, at a cost of $42,260,000. Built as hull number 185, it was launched on 19 December 1998 and delivered to her owners on 26 March 1999. ''Moscow University'' is long overall, with a beam of . The ship has a depth of and a draught of . It is propelled by a 6-cylinder Sulzer 6RTA58T

diesel engine The diesel engine, named after Rudolf Diesel, is an internal combustion engine in which ignition of the fuel is caused by the elevated temperature of the air in the cylinder due to mechanical compression; thus, the diesel engine is a so-ca ...

of driving a single screw propeller, which can propel ''Moscow University'' at . ''Moscow University'' is allocated the IMO Number 9166417 and uses the call sign ELWE8.

History

''Moscow University'' was built for Fancy Maritime SA, which is owned by Novoship, Novoship Novorossiysk, Russia. The ship was managed by Novoship (UK) Ltd., but management was transferred back to Russia in 2008, when many London-based employees of Novoship (U.K.) Ltd. were (starting in May 2008) made redundant. In December 2009, it was the first ship to leave Kozmino, Russia, with a cargo of oil, and was bound for Hong Kong.

Hijack and rescue

On 5 May 2010, ''Moscow University'' was attacked by Somalia, Somali pirates some off the coast of Somalia. The crew locked themselves in the ship's radar room or engine room. The was sent to assist ''Moscow University''. On 6 May 2010, the Russian destroyer ''Marshal Shaposhnikov'' arrived and fired two warning shots. The rescue operation then began when ''Marshal Shaposhnikov'' opened fire on the pirates with its cannons. Under the cover of this fire, a helicopter from the ship landed on the hijacked ship's deck and inserted Naval Infantry (Russia), Naval Infantry commandos on board, who quickly rescued the hijacked vessel. The entire crew escaped unharmed. One pirate was killed and 10 detained during the operation. Later, the pirates were set adrift in an inflatable boat – without weapons or navigation equipment – some from the coast. According to sources within the Russian Ministry of Defence, they did not reach the coast and likely died at sea. The pirates' disappearance has raised speculation that they were in fact executed by the Russian commandos, particularly in the light of Russian President Dmitri Medvedev's comments that "We'll have to do what our forefathers did when they met the pirates".

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Moscow University 1998 ships Merchant ships of Liberia Oil tankers Piracy in Somalia Maritime incidents in 2010