Monday, 27 August 2012
Lyubov Orlova sold for scrap.The sad tale of the adventure cruise ship, Lyubov Orlova, seems to just go on and on.
The Lyubov Orlova, which has accrued more than $200,000 in unpaid berthing fees, lists badly. The sad tale of the adventure cruise ship, Lyubov Orlova, seems to just go on and on.After being arrested back in 2010, the ship was bought by an Iranian scrap merchant for $275,000 in March and destined for the scrappers. But an unconfirmed report says the ship caught fire as it was leaving the harbour and was towed back in.
The Lyubov Orlova, which has accrued more than $200,000 in unpaid berthing fees, lists badly. The sad tale of the adventure cruise ship, Lyubov Orlova, seems to just go on and on.After being arrested back in 2010, the ship was bought by an Iranian scrap merchant for $275,000 in March and destined for the scrappers. But an unconfirmed report says the ship caught fire as it was leaving the harbour and was towed back in. The Lyubov Orlova, which has accrued more than $200,000 in unpaid berthing fees, lists badly. The sad tale of the adventure cruise ship, Lyubov Orlova, seems to just go on and on.After being arrested back in 2010, the ship was bought by an Iranian scrap merchant for $275,000 in March and destined for the scrappers. But an unconfirmed report says the ship caught fire as it was leaving the harbour and was towed back in.
Jan. - 24-2013
The tugboat tasked with hauling the MV Lyubov Orlova to the Dominican Republic was ordered to return to St. John’s harbour on Sunday, three days after the towing line snapped.
  The location of the MV Lyubov Orlova is unknown and it hasn’t been for over four days, says the ship’s owner Reza Shoeybi.
Shoeybi has been contacting Transport Canada and the Canadian Coast Guard since February 4 to try and get an update on the location of his vessel but with no luck."I call them every morning, they tell me to call back. They don’t know," he says. The last update he was given on the vessel’s location was February 4 and all he knows for sure is there is no way it’s still in that location now.

Febr.24-2013 According to Agence France-Presse (AFP) the Russian ship Lyubov Orlova has been adrift and has only just been located approximately 2,400 kilometres off the west coast of Ireland

 Sept.6-2013 Lyubov Orlova set adrift on purpose, NDP says
 Opposition blasts government over handling of Russian cruise ship
 When the Lyubov Orlova floated off into international waters last winter and became a ghost ship, it wasn’t just an accident or an isolated incident, according to NDP Transport critic Olivia Chow.
 Chow said Transport Canada has a history of this sort of thing. "Transport Canada should never have allowed it to be towed out of port in the dead of winter. Even for a city-slicker like me, I can tell you that in winter in the Maritimes, that’s the worst time for a ship to be towed," Chow said in an interview with The Telegram. "Husky Energy went to tow it away from the oil platform — understandable — but that’s where Transport Canada should have a plan to secure the ship. Instead, it’s benign neglect. "
 Documents obtained by The Telegram shed new light on the frantic efforts by Transport Canada to get the Lyubov Orlova under tow in late January, when it was drifting dangerously close to the Hibernia platform and the Sea Rose FPSO.
 The Lyubov Orlova hasn’t been seen in months, and it’s unclear whether it’s still adrift in the Atlantic, or if it sank.
Oct.2013 The chief of the Irish Coast Guard is expressing frustration with Canadian authorities for their February decision to send a derelict, rat-infested "biohazard" bobbing toward the Emerald Isle. "It was over 10 days from when it went missing to when we were told about it," Irish Coast Guard director Chris Reynolds told the Irish Independent this week. "We would have been much happier if they told us much earlier." "We could have sank it or towed it in for salvage." The biohazard in question is the , a former Arctic cruise ship that broke free from its tow line eight months ago while being pulled out of St. John’s harbour in Newfoundland. It was destined for a scrapyard in the Dominican Republic. Although briefly corralled, the Orlova was cut loose into international waters as soon as it was clear of Canadian offshore oil platforms. Transport Canada then announced it had "decided not to pursue the drifting vessel," due to safety concerns. Besides, "given current patterns and predominant winds," the agency said, "it is very unlikely that the vessel will re-enter waters under Canadian jurisdiction." Instead the Yugoslavia-built cruise ship became a logistical nightmare for Irish maritime authorities. In a February statement to the National Post, the Irish Department of Transport detailed the unprecedented regime of computer modelling and satellite data they quickly marshalled to figure out if, and when the rusty hulk would come smashing into Galway harbour. s of Wednesday, however, the MV Lyubov Orlova is still missing. "We can’t be certain it’s sunk, but we can’t be certain it’s not sunk," Mr. Reynolds told the BBC. As the liner was enroute to a scrapyard, the Lyubov Orlova had no transponders on board. Speaking to the BBC on Monday, Mr. Reynolds called it "essentially, 4,000 tonnes of metal." That, and untold swarms of rats. Before its ill-advised tow into the North Atlantic, the Lyubov Orlova spent two years tied up in St. John’s harbour, virtually guaranteeing its status as a floating rat colony. Or, as Mr. Reynolds called it, a "biohazard." "We don’t want rats from foreign ships coming onto Irish soil. If it came and broke up on shore, I’m sure local people wouldn’t be very happy about it," Mr. Reynolds told the Irish Independent. A much greater danger than Newfoundland rats, however, is the prospect of the Lyubov Orlova looming out of the fog and obliterating an Irish freighter or fishing vessel. "For us, the big danger is something hitting it," Mr. Reynolds told the BBC. "It can bump into something, or more likely, something can bump into it in the middle of the night in the Atlantic." Built in communist Yugoslavia in the 1970s, the MV Lyubov Orlova was serving as a luxury Arctic cruise ship when, in 2010, Canadian authorities seized the ship during a stopover in St. John’s as part of a lawsuit led by Cruise North Expeditions against the vessel’s Russian owners. There it stayed for two years before a scrap merchant picked up the ship for $275,000, hooked it up to an underpowered tug and set it on a course for the Dominican Republic. To the surprise of few veteran Newfoundland mariners, the tow line snapped after only 24 hours. Last month, NDP transport critic Olivia Chow said the rogue ship had been cut loose by the "benign neglect" of Canadian authorities. "Transport Canada should never have allowed it to be towed out of port in the dead of winter," she told Newfoundland’s The Telegram. "Even for a city-slicker like me, I can tell you that in winter in the Maritimes, that’s the worst time for a ship to be towed," she added, unwittingly proving her city-slicker status by confusing Newfoundland with the Maritimes. Source: National Post
Jan.24-2014The Lyubov Orlova, an unmanned cruise liner, has been drifting across the north Atlantic for the better part of a year, and salvage hunters say there is a strong chance it is heading towards the UK and Ireland.
Built in Yugoslavia in 1976, the unlucky vessel was abandoned in a Canadian harbour after its owners were embroiled in a debt scandal and failed to pay the crew. The authorities in Newfoundland tried to sell the hull for scrap – valued at £600,000 – to the Dominican Republic, but cut their losses when it came loose in a storm on the way. Sending the ship off into international waters, Transport Canada said it was satisfied the Lyubov Orlova "no longer poses a threat to the safety of [Canadian] offshore oil installations, their personnel or the marine environment".
Experts say the ship, which is likely to still contain hundreds of rats that have been eating each other to survive, must still be out there somewhere because not all of its lifeboat emergency beacons have been set off.
Two signals were picked up on the 12 and 23 March last year(2013) , presumably from lifeboats which fell away and hit the water, showing the vessel had made it two-thirds of the way across the Atlantic and was heading east. A week later, an unidentified object of about the right size was spotted on radar just off the coast of Scotland – but search planes never verified the find. Pim de Rhoodes, a Belgian salvage hunter who is among a number looking for the Lyubov Orlova off the UK coastline, said: "She is floating around out there somewhere.
"There will be a lot of rats and they eat each other. If I get aboard I'll have to lace everywhere with poison." The head of the Irish coastguard, Chris Reynolds, said the ship was more likely than not to still pose a threat."There have been huge storms in recent months but it takes a lot to sink a vessel as big as that," he said."We must stay vigilant." Source : Belfast Telegraph