MV Yulius Fuchik

Development and construction In the 1970s, the Soviet authorities issued a request for tenders for the construction of a vessel capable of carrying 25 to 30 barges with displacement of 1,300 tons. At that time, the Soviet Union had the most extensive inland waterway system in the world and the Rhine–Main–Danube Canal connecting the North Sea to the Black Sea was expected to open in the near future. Together with the increasing oil prices, the development of efficient barge-carrying systems with high loading and unloading rate generated considerable interest in the Soviet Union. However, a number of changes were made to the original design, and as a result the design costs accounted for some 25 percent of the man-hours spent on the project. The work included extensive model testing, which resulted in the adoption of a bulbous bow that alone increased the ships' service speed by 0.5 knots. At the time of her delivery, she was the most expensive ship ever constructed by a Finnish shipyard. The second ship, Tibor Szamueli — named after a Hungarian Communist leader — followed in 1979. The transportation service was offered under the brand "Danube-Sea Line". The barges carried by Yulius Fuchik were loaded in various ports along the Danube river and then pushed downstream to Sulina, Romania, where they were loaded in the ship. They were mainly transported to the Mekong Delta, a voyage that took around 18 days, and pushed upstream as far as Phnom Penh, Cambodia, for unloading. Occasionally, lighters were also carried to Karachi, Pakistan; Bombay, India; and Penang, Malaysia. The service continued until the early 1990s, when the demand for lighters dropped and the ships were laid up. The subsequent career of the Finnish-built barge carriers is unclear. Both Yulius Fuchik and Tibor Szamueli were sold in the late 1990s and renamed Production Driller and Development Driller respectively. Despite the names, it is uncertain if the ships were ever converted or otherwise used for offshore drilling. After the alleged plans for using the barge carriers to transport rolling stock from the United States to the Latin America fell through, the ships were laid up in Piraeus, Greece. The ships changed hands again in 2002. Production Driller was renamed Asian Alliance and Development Driller became Asian Reliance. Asian Alliance was renamed Alliance and broken up in Alang, India, while Asian Reliance was rechristened Reliance and then C Reliance, and scrapped on Gadani Beach, Pakistan. == Design ==

General characteristics Yulius Fuchik was long overall and between perpendiculars. She had a beam of and her depth to the upper deck was . From keel to mast, she measured . The draft of the ship when loaded to the summer load line was , corresponding to displacement of 60,262 tons. Her gross register tonnage was 35,817 register tons, net register tonnage 15,497 register tons and deadweight tonnage 37,850 tons. In terms of the main dimensions, Yulius Fuchik was slightly wider than the older Seabee ships, but otherwise her main dimensions were nearly identical to the original design. Cargo capacity Yulius Fuchik belonged to the distinct group of cargo ships known as barge carriers which offered, at the time, the highest theoretical loading and unloading rate of all cargo ships. The lighter aboard ship (LASH) system was based on unpowered barges, also known as lighters, that were loaded on board a larger vessel for transport between inland waterways separated by open seas. For this purpose, Yulius Fuchik had vast cargo decks and a large lifting platform in the stern. In addition to the purpose-built barges, Yulius Fuchik could also carry other types of cargo. Although each barge could be loaded with 15 standard 20-foot shipping containers, they could also be carried on the cargo decks and even moved around with the barge-handling equipment. Using special container adapters on the cargo rails, Yulius Fuchik could carry 1,312 loaded containers plus an additional 240 empty containers on the upper deck stacks, bringing the total container capacity to . In addition, 54 LASH-type barges (the type used by the nuclear-powered Sevmorput) could be carried with another set of adapters, and the decks were strengthened for ro-ro cargo with axle loads up to 22 tons. Power and propulsion Yulius Fuchik was powered by four 16-cylinder Wärtsilä-Pielstick 16PC2-5V400 medium-speed diesel engines located amidships, each producing at 504 rpm. The engines were coupled via double input/single output reduction gearboxes to two KaMeWa controllable pitch propellers turning at 135 rpm. The propeller shafts were of considerable length, and thus had to be supported by six bearings. The propulsion system gave the ship a maximum speed of , but her typical service speed was slightly less, . Underway, the ship burned heavy fuel oil at a rate of 128 tons per day. The propulsion system of Yulius Fuchik was the largest deviation from the original Seabee design which utilized a single steam turbine coupled to a fixed pitch propeller instead of the twin shaft diesel power plant. For maneuvering at ports, Yulius Fuchik was also equipped with a 900kW bow thruster. Onboard electricity was produced by four six-cylinder medium-speed Valmet-B&W 6S28 diesel alternators, each generating 1,250 kVA. == In popular culture ==

Yulius Fuchik played a prominent role in the 1986 techno-thriller Red Storm Rising by Tom Clancy and Larry Bond. In the novel, she was disguised as the American-flagged Seabee carrier Doctor Lykes and used to transport Soviet troops to Keflavik, Iceland. In order to conform with the slightly different silhouette of the Lykes Lines ship, parts of her superstructure were removed and the shape of the funnels was altered with prefabricated parts. Furthermore, the twenty-foot Interlighter markings on the side of the ship were painted over and replaced with "Lykes Lines," and the white L on a blue diamond of the Lykes Brothers Steamship Company emblem was added on the forward superstructure. Later in the book, Yulius Fuchik was spotted by an American P-3C Orion shortly after launching four Lebed class hovercraft from her cargo deck. After an SA-7 surface-to-air missile launched from the ship failed to hit the Orion, the American plane retaliated with a Harpoon anti-ship missile and called in two F-15s to strafe the ship with their 20 mm cannons. The damaged Yulius Fuchik eventually reached the port of Keflavik and, after running aground during the approach, slowly settled to the bottom next to the quay in water only a few feet deeper than the draught of the vessel. == Notes ==