St.Petersburg, September 4 (AVN) - The local Severnaya Verf shipyard will lay the keel of the Svyatitel Alexy bulk carrier on September 10, Svetlana Yermolayeva, aide to the plant's director general, said on Tuesday.
Patriarch of Moscow and all Russia Alexy II will arrive in St. Petersburg especially to attend the ceremony, Yermolayeva told the Military News Agency.
The shipyard has laid down two river-sea-class bulk carriers for the North-western steamship line before, The first vessel named Svyatoi Apostol Andrei was laid down on January 26, 2001, and the second named Svyatoi Knyaz Vladimir on May 25. The series will comprise 10 universal bulk carriers of Project 01010 Valdai developed by the Vympel design bureau in Nizhny Novgorod.
Project 01010 ships have the length of 128.2m, width of 16.74m, cargo capacity of 3,950t on the river and 3,950t in the sea, speed of 11 knots and crew of 10, the director said. They are intended for transportation of general and bulk commodities, such as wood, timber, fertilisers, or paper, without transhipment. One vessel costs USD6m.
The Svyatoi Apostol Andrei will be commissioned by the cutomer in late March 2002 and the entire ceries in early 2004. The project is financed out of the Russian Savings Bank's USD49m credit with the interest rate of 16 percent a year in hard currency. The money should be repaid by 2008.