Northern Sea route – History and Today

The Northern Sea route (NSR) is the shortest water route to connect West to East. On documents the NSR is from Kara Strait to Bearing Strait as in below image. The complete route is part of the Arctic Ocean and is within the territory of Russian EEZ (Exclusive  Economic Zone) , the  six major sea ports located on this route are as below

1.        Dudinka

2.        Dikson

3.        Tiksi

4.        Peven

5.        Sabetta

6.        Khatanga

 History of Northern Sea route

This route would have been explored historically long back. More over as per the record Russian traders on coast of white sea have been exploring this route since 11th century.

1496 - In the book published by Sigismund von Herberstein mentions the voyage of Grigory Istoma through the Northern Sea Route during this year.

1553 -British Explorer Hugh Willoughby is said to pass near the NSR

1596 – Dutch explorer Willem Barentsz discovered  Bear Island and Spitsbergen and the map for his 3rd ill voyage was drawn by Theodore de  Bry is depicted as below

1619 - Russia closed the Mengazeya route in order to avoid the English and Dutch attacks on Siberia.

1878–1879 – Nordik ship Vega was recorded as first vessel to completely pass the NSR. It was then proved that this route was navigable but not commercially practical.

1932 - The Russian icebreaker ship Sibiryakov completed her first trip within one season through the Northern Sea route, proving that Russia can control it without any dependency on any other country.

1991 - NSR route and its navigation declined after collapse of USSR

Presently it is used for transportation of Oil and other resource using ice breaker

It is also interesting to note that globally only Russia has ice breaker ship running on Nuclear Power. Presently Russia has five such ships.

Comparison of Global Sea route with Northern Sea route

New Shipping lines using this route

Hainan Yangpu New Shipping Co Ltd of China and Rosatom, Russia’s state nuclear energy has partnered to work together to optimize to use this route.

They are launching a regular liner service connecting Chinese ports to European ports of Rotterdam, Felixstowe, Hamburg and Gdansk.

Conclusion

The present sanctions on Russia have increased the dependency of NSR completely on Russia and its Asian allies, but It’s the Window of future sea-trade. It will grow with time and technological advancement.