During a meeting of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities in Odessa, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky set the government the task to develop a full-fledged long-term program for the revival of Ukraine’s research fleet. The official Internet office of the President communicated this news. The Head of the State stressed that Ukraine began to rebuild its scientific fleet, in particular, it acquired a British icebreaker.
“Ukraine is a member of prestigious world clubs of space and Antarctic states. And today Ukraine returns or is begins to return to the World Ocean,” – the President said.
According to him, this provides Ukraine with great opportunities to study ocean resources and participate on an equal footing in global projects. The President stressed that the World Ocean is a space where many scientific discoveries take place, and in order to have a worthy place in this space, our country must build its ships.
The President also called on the regions to join the work on development of a program aimed at revival of the research fleet, especially those with a shipbuilding tradition, relevant personnel, educational institutions and production facilities.
Volodymyr Zelensky inspected the research icebreaker purchased at the expense of the State, which will allow our scientists to recommence the study of the World Ocean and significantly improve the logistics of the Ukrainian Akademik Vernadsky Antarctic station. According to the National Antarctic Science Center, the icebreaker was previously used by the British Antarctic Service and was called “James Clark Ross”. On August 19 this year, the legendary ship was purchased by Ukraine, and on October 5 she arrived at Odessa. Today, the flagship of the Ukrainian research fleet received a new name – “Noosphere”. It is symbolic, because the term itself comes from the works of Volodymyr Vernadsky, after whom our station is named. So now the names of the icebreaker and the station are logically complemented. The noosphere means the sphere of interaction between the society and nature.
A new name, “Borys Oleksandrov”, was given to the scientific vessel “Belgica”; Ukraine received her as a gift from the Belgian government. According to Radio Svoboda, the ship will be used to monitor the Black Sea, in particular, for seabed research and environmental data collection. She came to Odessa on October 21, 2021. The ship is planned to be sent to the first expedition in December this year. Borys Oleksandrov is the late Director of the Institute of Marine Biology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, a corresponding member of the National Academy of Sciences. He died in a fire that almost completely destroyed the Institute building in early December 2019.
Dmytro SHULIKIN
Svit newspaper, № 41 – 42, November 2021