gCaptain.com

We know that Friday is not gCaptain’s most popular day of the week so today’s nautical quiz should be an easy on. At least for those of you who follow the Maritime Blogosphere.

So what is it?

UPDATE:

Congratulations to Mike who stressfully identified this boat as “A” the personal yacht of Russian billionaire Andrey Melnichenko. You can find all the photos, video and information on this yacht at Monacoeye.com and The WSJ. Thanks to Peter for the find.

Quiz: What city in the world is home to the most billionares? The Answer to this question may suprise you. According to Forbes the honor goes to Moscow.

Pictured above is the Yacht of 41 year old oil tycoon Roman Abramovich. Enlgish Russia tells us:

Roman Abramovich, the Russian Richest Guy (as of 2006), has visited St. Petersburg a few days ago on his “Pelorus” boat, the largest private yacht in the world, with the size of the football field and the price tag of 245,000e or $500,000. He had not come alone, but escorted by two luxury cruise ships carrying other less fortunate Russian

While he is in fact only the 15th richest man and the boat is only the world’s 11th largest, it’s impressive non the less.

Click HERE for the full photo spread.

This admittedly isn’t the newest military tech on the block, but I just couldn’t help writing it up. Russia makes the world’s largest military hovercraft dubbed the “Zubr.” It displaces 621 tons and can haul twice the payload of similar boats from the US Navy (somewhere around 150 tons). 

With production dating back to 1988, the last Zubr looks to have launched in 2004. Capable of carrying multiple tanks and a nice mix of 140mm rocket pods, 30mm cannons and air defense missiles, the Zubr can cruise for 300 miles before rapidly deploying troops and equipment close to shore. Scratch that. Directly on shore. In other words, it’s just like that R/C vehicle you lusted after in the ’90s, but it’s way bigger and actually good for something. Or, in this case, potentially very, very bad.

via Gizmodo.com

___________________________

This post was written by Richard Rodriguez, Rescue Tug Captain, and US Coast Guard approved instructor for License Training. You can read more of his articles at the BitterEnd of the net.

The Picture Blog, Dark Roasted Blend is featuring a series on Russian Nuclear Icebreakers.

Here’s a sample: The balance of the pics are here.

Paired up for the voyage

The Voyage Plan

Sunrise

The Reactor Control Room

The Reactor

Here’s the video version via Sea Fever.

Nuclear Icebreaker

for more Nuclear Goodness CLICK HERE or take our nuclear cargo quiz HERE.

Photos by Svetlana Bogdanova; seamen of the Murmansk Sea Shipping Company via Dark Roasted Blend. Blog post by gCaptain and Bitterend’s chief blogger Richard Rodriguez

EnglishRussia.com has some amazing photos of November’s deadly storm in the black sea. Click HERE to view the photo set.

We are starting a new feature here on gCaptain titled “Interesting Ship Of The Week” and the first vessel we’d like to share this unusual barge transporter near Krasnoyarskaya Russia.

Unfortunately we don’t have many details but the pictures tell most of the story. Visit EnglishRussia.com for the high resolution images.

UPDATE:

Capdiamont offers the details behind this railed giant;

 I can’t find the original source he used, but it is a massive electrically powered rack railway that hauls  ships,  up and over a dam in Russia. At the top it has a turntable  so the locomotive  can be turned to keep it’s load straight, no matter which way it goes. Think of the top of the dam as the crest. In order to keep the downhill side always downhill, you have to turn it. This one is unusual because the top of the turntable is slanted to keep the locomotive slanted, so the load stays level. Add to all this, is the massive size of everything. This has to be the longest, and heaviest turntable in the world.

If you look at some of the pictures, you can see the gears to mesh in to the rails. That is my reasoning for it to be a rack railway, even though it doesn’t have the traditional center rack, like you would think. (Source: Capdiamont)

We are glad to get the facts behind this story. Honest thanks also goes out to NavaGear for the English lesson in the comments.

Breaking weather news from Russia. Bloomberg tells us;

An oil spill from a tanker that sank in a storm in waters between Russia and Ukraine threatens an “environmental catastrophe,” said Vladimir Slivyak, head of the Moscow-based Ecodefense group.

The Volgoneft-139 leaked 1,300 tons of fuel oil into the Kerch Strait linking the Black Sea and Sea of Azov, a Russian Transport Ministry spokeswoman, who declined to be identified, said in Moscow. Four other ships sank in yesterday’s storm that produced six-meter (20-foot) waves, state broadcaster Russia Today reported. Two sailors are dead and 23 are missing, it said.

“The effect will be very serious for the whole marine ecosystem, including fish, because of the high toxicity of oil products,” Slivyak said by telephone in Moscow yesterday. It will take several months to remove the oil on the surface, while the oil that sank will be “very hard” to clear, he added. Continue Reading…

1,300 tons converts to approximately 560,000 gallons of fuel oil or 10 times that which was spilt last week by the Cosco Busan in San Francisco Bay. No specifics yet but maybe Robin Storm can enlighten us.

CNN has some impressive video as well: LINK

The Wall Street Journal brings us video on Russia’s newest idea, floating nuclear power plants.

sharedVideo(1152279023)

Thanks to Sea-Fever for the link.