The gas pipeline from Inkoo to Paldiski in Estonia broke last October. The likely culprit is a Chinese ship bound for St. Petersburg, which dragged its anchor along the seabed.
TALLINN The Balticconnector gas pipeline repair work has been completed. Gas started flowing in the pipeline between Estonia and Finland on Monday morning.
The damage site was located at a depth of 60 meters on the seabed. The repair work was done with remote-controlled equipment, meaning divers were not used for the work.
– Normally, a repair of this scale would take one to two years. Balticconnector was repaired in seven months, gas pipeline maintenance manager Tiit Toomits states the Estonian grid company Elering in the bulletin.
According to ‘s information, the repair work will cost almost 40 million euros.
– We are negotiating with the insurance company about compensating the damage. There is no decision yet, Elering’s communications manager Ain Köster told by phone.
Suspected guilty ship in St. Petersburg without anchor
Elering and the Finnish transmission network company Gasgrid closed the Balticconnector during the first hours of October 8 due to a sudden pressure drop. On the same day, a fault was also detected in the data cable between Finland and Estonia.
Since the damage point of the gas pipe was located in Finland’s economic zone, the investigation was started in Finland.
Official investigations first revealed a hole in the gas pipe. Over the course of a couple of weeks, tens of kilometers of lagging marks were found on the seabed. On October 24, the Central Criminal Police and the Border Guard announced that an anchor had been found next to the damage site.
The Chinese ship Newnew Polar Bear was known to have passed over the Balticconnector at the exact time of the accident. Later, the ship was spotted in St. Petersburg without its second anchor. Therefore, based on the technical investigation, the krp suspects that the Chinese ship broke the gas pipe.
At the press conference at the end of October, the general director of the investigation Risto Lohi said that the ship was contacted several times, but the ship was not willing to cooperate.
Since then, the Finnish authorities have focused on cooperating with the Chinese authorities and pursuing the management of the shipping company that owns the Chinese ship.