Caesar Kunikov in the Red Sea, 2003
| |
History | |
---|---|
Russia | |
Name | Caesar Kunikov |
Namesake | Tsezar Kunikov |
Builder | Stocznia Północna, Gdańsk, Poland[1] |
Commissioned | 30 October 1986[1] |
Homeport | Sevastopol |
General characteristics [1] | |
Class and type | Ropucha-class landing ship |
Displacement | |
Length | 112.5 m (369 ft 1 in) |
Beam | 15.01 m (49 ft 3 in) |
Draught | 4.26 m (14 ft 0 in) |
Ramps | Over bows and at stern |
Installed power | 3 × 750 kW (1,006 hp) diesel generators |
Propulsion | 2 × 9,600 hp (7,159 kW) Zgoda-Sulzer 16ZVB40/48 diesel engines |
Speed | 17.59 knots (32.58 km/h; 20.24 mph) |
Range |
|
Endurance | 30 days |
Capacity | 10 × main battle tanks and 340 troops or 12 × BTR APC and 340 troops or 3 × main battle tanks, 3 × 2S9 Nona-S SPG, 5 × MT-LB APC, 4 trucks and 313 troops or 500 tons of cargo |
Complement | 98 |
Armament |
|
Service record | |
Part of: |
|
Caesar Kunikov (BDK-64), correctly Tsezar Kunikov (Russian: «Цезарь Куников» (БДК-64), romanized: Tsezar' Kunikov) was a Project 775 (NATO reporting name: Ropucha-I-class) large landing ship (Bol'shoy Desantnyy Korabl) of the Russian Navy. The ship was built in Poland, launched in 1986 and named after Soviet Naval Infantry officer Tsezar Kunikov. As part of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, it took part in the KFOR mission, the Russo-Georgian War, the Syrian Civil War, and the Russo-Ukrainian War.
On 14 February 2024, the Ukrainian military announced that its forces hit the ship with several unmanned surface vehicle (USV) while off the coast of Crimea, causing it to start sinking.[3] Russian spokespersons declined to comment on the report, however they said that Russian forces had destroyed six USVs in the Black Sea.[4]
The ship could house a crew of 87 and had improved defensive armament.[3]
The ship was built at the Stocznia Północna shipyard in Gdańsk, Poland, and launched on 30 October 1986.[1] It is named after Tsezar Kunikov, a Soviet naval infantry officer.[4]
She was in service with Black Sea Fleet's 197th Landing Ship Brigade, of the 30th Division of Surface Ships, and homeported in Sevastopol. She was under the patronage of the city of Zelenograd (since 1998)[5] and Chelyabinsk Oblast (since 2011).[6]
The ship has taken part in several conflicts on behalf of the Russian Navy. In 1999 she and 3 other Black Sea Fleet's landing ships were used for deployment of the Russian contingent on the KFOR mission in Kosovo.[7] The ship took part in the Russo-Georgian conflict in 2008.[3] In October 2015, Caesar Kunikov was sent to Syria with a cargo of weapons and ammunition for the Syrian Arab Army.[8]
On 24 March 2022 the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces reported that Caesar Kunikov and her sister ship Novocherkassk had been damaged during an attack that destroyed the Tapir-class landing ship Saratov in the port of Berdiansk during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.[9] Video of the incident showed the Caesar Kunikov and Novocherkassk retreating from the port soon after the attack; one of the ships' forecastles was on fire,[10] although it is unclear which.[11]
On 18 April 2022 it was reported that the ship's commander, Captain 3rd rank Alexander Chirva, died during the invasion of Ukraine.[12][13]
On 24 August 2022 it was reported that Caesar Kunikov and Novocherkassk were out of action due to lack of spare parts to repair the ships. The lack of spare parts was attributed to the sanctions imposed on Russia.[14] According to Ukrainian spokespersons, the ship was later used to transport ammunition.[3]
On 14 February 2024, Ukrainian Armed Forces released a statement through Telegram that they had attacked the Caesar Kunikov using MAGURA V5 unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) while the ship was off the coast of Alupka in Crimea.[15] The Crimean peninsula has been annexed by Russia since 2014. Loud explosions were reportedly heard in the region, according to posts on social media.[16] The attack was carried out by the special forces unit "Group 13", which also carried out the 1 February attack on the Russian missile boat Ivanovets.[15][4] In the statement, the Main Directorate of Intelligence of Ukraine said, "In summary, Tsezar Kunikov received a critical breach on the port side and started sinking."[3] The General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces said that Russian rescue operations were not successful and that they believe most of the crew did not survive.[16][17]
Ukraine later released grainy and edited video of the attack, showing the ship being attacked by USVs and receiving damage.[18][15] Analyzing the video, reporters at the BBC were able to verify the ship on the video was a Ropucha-class landing ship;[19] Reuters was able to identify the ship in the video as the Caesar Kunikov but could not verify the date or location of the video.[3] According to the Associated Press, the private intelligence firm Ambrey concluded that the video showed the ship being attacked by three USVs, and that the ship likely sank.[4] There has been no additional confirmation of Ukrainian claims relating to the attack.[20][18]
The Russian Defense Ministry said it had recently destroyed six unmanned surface vehicles (USV) in the Black Sea.[21] When asked for comment on the Caesar Kunikov, both Russian military and Kremlin spokespersons declined to comment.[4][15]
Ukraine said that the Caesar Kunikov was the 25th Russian ship it had disabled.[15]
Article Russian ship Caesar Kunikov in English Wikipedia took following places in local popularity ranking:
Presented content of the Wikipedia article was extracted in 2024-02-15 based on https://en.wikipedia.org/?curid=18960827