Putin’s yacht repaired for $ 1 million

Official floating residence of Vladimir Putin, Kavkaz yacht has gone through “medical treatment” in a St Petersburg dockyard. Within 8 months, running gear of the vessel, radio navigation equipment, steering system were changed, a new condition system installed and interior renovated. Now, Kavkaz is moving along channels: at first, along Volga-Baltic Channel, afterwards, along Volga-Don Channel to Black Sea. The 45-metre-long yacht is of 254 ton displacement and has a speed of 31 knots. It will moor at one of the three mooring lines of the President’s Sochi residence Bocharov Stream, not far from the city of Sochi. Apropos, Kavkaz is one of the two governmental yachts built in 1980 by St Petersburg Almaz work according to personal order of then-Secretary General Leonid Brezhnev. The second yacht Krym serves now the Ukrainian President and moors at Donuzlav moor line, in Crimea. Though, they say Krym has not been repaired since Soviet times. While Putin’s Kavkaz is quite opposite. According to some information, this year, a sum of 900,000 to 1,000,000 dollars was spent to repair it. After the repair, Kavkaz will perfectly serve Vladimir Putin while driving him over Black Sea for not less than 5 guaranteed years. There is information that Almaz Central Design Office (constructing small above-water vessels) has already received an order to create a new yacht. Apropos, the Almaz also designed small anti-submarine and patrol boats, which always could bee seen in the Sea when the President comes to his Bocharov Stream residence.

Photograph: the President’s yacht

A.M. specially for PRAVDA.Ru

Translated by Vera Solovieva

Read the original in Russian: http://www.pravda.ru/main/2002/06/04/42215.html