MV Arvin Moment of breaking of the ship (Video) #shipwrecks #Ship_Accident

This is the M/V Arvin, a Russian-built ship sailing under a Palau flag registered under "Arvin Sg Ltd". She was anchored at the Black Sea port of Bartin (Turkey) and broke in half while anchored and sank Jan 17, 2021 during rough sea currents. Out of the 13 people on board; 6 were rescued, 4 were killed, 3 remained missing as of the time of the search operation. 11 of the souls on board were Ukrainian, and 2 were Russian. The ship was built in 1975 in Czechoslovakia for the USSR as a dry goods transporter. The ship was designed for mainly for river and lake operations as a barge freighter. She was never designed for rough weather of any sort or the open ocean at all. Despite that fact, she continued to operate in the Black Sea, a region noted for its adverse weather and rough high currents after suffering from over 30 years of poor maintenance and neglect since being sold in 1992 from Russian ownership. These ships are essentially open topped bathtubs with no rigidity, and you can watch them twist and bend just from passing a ship’s wake if they’re unladen. It is not uncommon to see older ones at the end of their service life have several cracks at the deck edge, which will quickly propagate down the hullside if the ship is kept in service. A port state control inspection in Georgia in 2020 found extensive deficiencies on board the Arvin, including severe deck corrosion (softness) and ill-maintained (not functional) weathertight hatches. The Volgo-Balt series of ships were given a restriction on class and were not permitted to sail more than 100 miles from safe haven. The entire merchant marine fleet in the Black Sea is known for the very poor condition of its ships and the inhumanely poor conditions for the sailors. Olga Ananina, the ITF inspector in Novorossiysk, remarked. “Today the bulkers operate under flag of Panama and under control of Orbital Ship Management. All ships are old and problematic. The wage debts, low wage levels not exceeding the ILO rates, lack of provisions, drinking water, working wear, or cleaning materials – all of these are normal for the rust buckets which sink every year claiming seafarers’ lives." The Seafarers’ Union of Russia strongly recommends to shy away from hiring on these ships as they pose a danger to navigational safety and seafarers lives. From 1975-1992 before the ship was renamed to the M/V "Arvin", she was known as the VOLGO-BALT 189. The ship worked for the USSR and then White Sea & Onega. After the USSR decommissioned it, it was sold off and eventually became property of Palau as its final owner after being registered in Malta, Iran, and Cambodia over the next 30 years. Sister ships Volgo Balt 179 (built 1973) and Volgo Balt 214 (built 1978) also broke apart and sank in the years prior to the Arvin (Volgo Balt 189). There are many of these Volgo-Balt vessels, built during Soviet times, that is still in operation under different flags and in different trades across the world.

"you know it's serious when Russians speak English"

From what I've read of this incident, the ship was not designed for open water in the first place. It was designed to operate primarily in inland rivers. Furthermore, the ship had been badly neglected and was showing significant corrosion damage in major structural members.

He collected himself quick and got on the radio immediately. Well done

You know things are bad when even the Russians sound panicked.

lets all appreciate the random Russian guy who took the camera to save the footage for all of us to see

As an ex-submariner, my heart prays for those men of the Sea on the Arvin that are forever on watch and their families who mourn their loss.

This has happened to so many ships on the Great Lakes. To see it breaking in half is tragic but it’s interesting to see it actually happening on video. Stories of ore/coal ships breaking in half and sinking in less than just 10-20 minutes were commonplace several decades ago. Sadly the shipping companies that owned the ships would always claim that “it sank because the crew was negligent”. One ship was said to have buckled and broken in half but the stern of the ship (the back) with all lights still on and engine still running normally continued going for a couple miles before the lights went out and it “disappeared”. The bow of the ship (front) sank soon after the disaster. The survivor who told his story was called a liar and sued but lost due to the lack of evidence. Decades later in more recent times they sent down a drone and found that the ship did in fact break in half and that the stern continued going for 5 miles before sinking.

To those that wonder why there were sailors below decks, I suggest that they were not watching T.V., but were engaged in running bilge pumps, securing hatchways, mixing bunker fuel with solvents, etc. etc. There is a reason why the merchant mariners of this world make a good living...it is hard, lonely, cold, and dangerous work. R.I.P.

7 sailors working below deck died and are still missing. may their souls rest in peace.

This wasn't an accident, it was gross negligence that put an unseaworthy ship into stormy waters.

Having served on fishing vessels in the Bering Sea and Tropical Pacific I can say with certainty that constant situational awareness is essential. Being on a ship breaking apart would test the mettle of the hardest person. May those who passed on the M/V Arvin RIP

“Mayday mayday my vessel broken”. I can unequivocally say that he was speaking the truth.

Definitely an "oh shit" moment when the front of your ship starts flopping around.

Starting as the Volgo-Balt 189, the MV Arvin was originally built in 1974 in Czechoslovakia as a lake/river freighter. She was sold and reflagged several times through her life. She was named Arvin in 1997 by the Delphin Maritime Co. Ltd., the name she kept for the rest of her career.[1] The Volgo-Balt class were lake/river freighters, meant to sail within generally calm water, and were not intended for the high seas. Nevertheless, many of them have seen use on and around the Black Sea. Several of these have sunk, including the Volgo-Balt 214, lost in 2019, killing six of 13 crew.[3] Two months after the Arvin sank, Volgo-Balt 179 sank in the Black Sea, with 10 of 13 crew surviving.[4] In 2020, port officials in Georgia noted severe deck corrosion and poorly maintained weather hatches on the Arvin, suggesting that the ship should be scrapped.[5] Her owner kept her at sea, though. She was due for a major audit in April 2021.[6]

Guys this was an old SOVIET era built barge, and it was a RIVER barge- never intended to be used at sea. But the Ukrainian company that owns the ship- decided it's OK to send this outdated river ship into Black Sea, where storm has hit it.

I have been on a sinking boat issuing a mayday call. With waters below freezing I had about 15-45 minutes that I could survive in the water, rescue came at 30 minutes. One of the guys who rescued me took off his own (warm) shirt and put on me, I was trembling too much to do it myself, so he actually had to dress me! I never got his name, coast guard got there and took me away, but to this day, 15 years later, I still have that shirt. There's some kind of maritime law that says you have to respond to mayday calls, but I prefer to think we all feel a moral obligation to do so. Being a person who has been rescued from certain death, I feel like I would definitely risk my own life to rescue someone else if the need ever arises. Edit - I am not changing the wording above. When I posted this it was just to tell people about a near-death experience I've had in my life. People who have been through something similar seem to have an appreciation for life as we have seen how fragile it is, as well as a deep respect for those who perform a rescue. I didn't think it would become a topic of semantics, where my phrase "waters below freezing" would call into question the scientific fact that water freezes at a certain temperature therefore if it is below freezing it is ice and no longer water. My statement would be best changed to state "waters near freezing", changing the word below to near. Let's just leave it as it is and each reader can take away from it what they choose. I must say though that some of these comments make my blood boil! (Hahaha, see what I did there, open a whole new can of worms)

"vessel broken" is maritime code for something really bad

The moment she breaks apart and you see the violence of the water breaking bulkheads and rushing in. You can tell how the vibrations from the water breaking these shale the whole vessel. That’s a feeling that as a sailor I’m sure anyone under deck knew the severity of such a feeling. Though there last moments were distressing I hope and pray that they are resting peacefully.

“Vessel broken” is both super vague “no shit, how?”…and perfectly accurate.