Russia's Northern Fleet Slava Class Cruiser Marshal Ustinov to rejoin Russian Fleet in 2016

: Posted On Wednesday, 30 September 2015 09:17

Naval Forces News - Russia

Russia's Northern Fleet Slava Class Cruiser Marshal Ustinov to rejoin Russian Fleet in 2016

The Russian Navy Northern Fleet missile cruiser Marshal Ustinov, currently undergoing repairs and modernization at the Zvyozdochka defense shipyard in Severodvinsk, northwest Russia, will be armed with a new missile system and will be back in service again in 2016, the enterprise’s general director Nikolay Kalistratov said Tuesday. The Marshal Ustinov, a Slava-class missile cruiser, was launched in 1982 and commissioned with the Russian Northern Fleet in 1986. It has been undergoing a refit at the Zvezdochka shipyard in northern Russia since 2011.

A starboard bow view of the Slava Class Russian guided missile cruiser MARSHAL USTINOV underway. Picture: US Navy

"It has been decided to equip the vessel with a new [missile] system. The ship will be handed to Russia’s navy, as envisioned by the contract, in 2016," Kalistratov said.

The completion of the work, which included repair of the propulsion system and overhaul of the ship’s missile, communications and navigation systems, was originally scheduled for 2014. However, diagnostics revealed that the majority of electrical cables on the vessel must be replaced, the yard said.

The Marshal Ustinov missile cruiser was laid down at the Nikolayev shipyard in 1978. It was made part of the Northern Fleet in 1986. In 1994-1997 it underwent upgrade at St. Petersburg’s Severnaya Verf shipyard.

The Marshal Ustinov is a missile cruiser of Project 1164 Atlant. It has a displacement of 11,380 tons, is 186 meters long and 20.8 meters wide. It can travel at a speed up to 34 knots to distances of about 8,000 miles, and has a crew of 510 people.

The Slava-class cruisers were designed as surface strike ships with some anti-air and ASW capability, and have a primary armament of sixteen SS-N-12 Sandbox (P-500 Bazalt) nuclear-capable supersonic anti-ship missiles. The Russian Navy has three such missile cruisers: the Moskva in the Black Sea Fleet, the Varyag in the Pacific Fleet and the Marshal Ustinov in the Northern Fleet.