Fire Breaks Out Aboard Icebreaker Admiral Makarov During St Petersburg Refit

Fire broke out on 5 September aboard the diesel icebreaker Admiral Makarov while the vessel lay alongside in St Petersburg undergoing an overhaul. The Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations sent crews to the pier where the ship was being worked on by Kronstadt Marine Shipyard.

The fire appears to have started in the steering gear area and spread across roughly 80 square metres of the vessel. Ten units and 52 personnel were committed to fighting it. Containment took about two hours, and a further two hours passed before the fire was fully extinguished. No injuries were recorded, and the extent of the damage to the ship has not been detailed.

The icebreaker was built in 1975 at the Helsinki yard then operated by Wartsila and entered service in June of that year. Rosmorport, which manages the vessel, has said it completed an overhaul in May 2025 that included hull painting and propeller repairs. The ship had been in the yard since February 2025, with work on the main engines scheduled to run to the end of 2026.

At 135 metres in length and displacing about 20,000 tonnes, the vessel can work ice up to 1.5 metres thick at speeds of up to two knots. It was designed to carry 100 tonnes of cargo and as many as 12 passengers, and to operate independently for up to three months on the fuel it carries. Its complement is 58, and the accommodation includes a sauna, a swimming pool and a gym for long deployments.

The ship had been working in the Arctic Basin before entering the yard last year. It was subsequently transferred to the North-Western Basin Branch and had been earmarked for icebreaking duty in the eastern Gulf of Finland, where it would have supported navigation through the coming winter. The casualty leaves that assignment in question at a point in the year when yard capacity for a vessel of this age and size is limited.

This story is part of the Maritime Briefing of 8 September 2026.