MOSCOW. Aug 13 (Interfax-AVN) - Ships of Russia's Northern Fleet will monitor ice conditions and hold a drill in the course of an Arctic voyage, the fleet's press service said on Monday.
"Today, a group of ships and support vessels of the Northern Fleet led by the destroyer Vice Admiral Kulakov passed through the Kara Gates Strait between the islands of Novaya Zemlya and Vaigach and continued to complete objectives on its Arctic voyage in the Kara Sea," the press service said.
Monitoring ice conditions will be the primary task in the Kara Sea. In addition, the ships will hold a series of rescue drills on the Northern Sea Route, the fleet said.
The Norther Fleet's ships and support vessels started their Arctic voyage on August 8.
Vice Admiral Oleg Golubev, the commander of the Northern Fleet's Kola Combined-Arms Flotilla, is supervising the voyage. The ships will go along the Northern Sea Route to the Novosibirsk Islands, holding a number of exercises on the way and at bases on the Arctic islands.
The unit comprises the destroyer Vice Admiral Kulakov, the landing ships Alexander Otrakovsky and Kondopoga, the minesweeper Vladimir Gumanenko, the icebreaker Ilya Muromets, the tanker Sergei Osipov, the tug Pamir, and the lifting-and-mooring barge KIL-143.
While in the Barents Sea, the Northern Fleet's warships and support vessels practiced protecting Russian economic facilities and working together with ships of the Federal Security Service's border protection division.