Thread: Finland boards oil tanker suspected of causing internet, power cable outages

Finnish authorities on Thursday (Dec 26) seized a ship carrying Russian oil in the Baltic Sea on suspicion it caused the outage of an undersea power cable connecting Finland and Estonia a day earlier, and that it also damaged or broke four internet lines.


The Cook Islands-registered ship, named by authorities as the Eagle S, was boarded by a Finnish coast guard crew that took command and sailed the vessel to Finnish waters, a coast guard official said at a press conference.


"From our side we are investigating grave sabotage," said Robin Lardot, director of the Finnish National Bureau of Investigation.


"According to our understanding, an anchor of the vessel that is under investigation has caused the damage," he added.


The Finnish customs service said it had seized the vessel's cargo and that the Eagle S was believed to belong to Russia's so-called shadow fleet of ageing tankers that seek to evade sanctions on the sale of Russian oil.

Two fibre-optic cables owned by Finnish operator Elisa linking Finland and Estonia were broken, while a third link between the two countries owned by China's Citic was damaged, Finnish transport and communications agency Traficom said.


A fourth internet cable running between Finland and Germany and belonging to Finnish group Cinia was also believed to have been severed, the agency said.


"We are coordinating closely with our allies and stand ready to support their investigations," said a spokesperson for the US National Security Council, adding that the incident underscored the need for closer international cooperation on safeguarding critical undersea infrastructure.


"We are following investigations by Estonia and Finland, and we stand ready to provide further support," NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said in a post on social media X.


Both the Finnish and Estonian governments held extraordinary meetings on Thursday to assess the situation, they said in separate statements.

Baltic Sea nations are on high alert for potential acts of sabotage following a string of outages of power cables, telecom links and gas pipelines since 2022, although subsea equipment is also subject to technical malfunction and accidents.


The European Union said it strongly condemned any deliberate destruction of the continent's infrastructure.


"We commend the Finnish authorities for their swift action in boarding the suspected vessel," said a joint statement from EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas and the European Commission, the bloc's executive body.


Repairing the 170km Estlink 2 interconnector will take months, and the outage raised the risk of a strained power supply during the winter, operator Fingrid said in a statement.

Estonian Prime Minister Kristen Michal said, however, that his country would continue to have sufficient access to electricity.


The Eagle S Panamax oil tanker crossed the Estlink 2 electricity cable at 10.26am GMT on Wednesday, a Reuters review of MarineTraffic ship tracking data showed, identical to the time when Fingrid said the power outage occurred.


United Arab Emirates-based Caravella, which according to MarineTraffic data owns the Eagle S, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.


Peninsular Maritime, which, according to MarineTraffic acts as a technical manager for the ship, declined to comment outside of the company's opening hours.

"DISRUPT AND DETER"


Damage to subsea installations in the Baltic Sea has now become so frequent that it is difficult to believe this was caused merely by accident or poor seamanship, Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna said in a statement.


"We must understand that damage to submarine infrastructure has become more systematic and thus must be regarded as attacks against our vital structures," Tsahkna said.


The 658 megawatt (MW) Estlink 2 outage began at midday local time on Wednesday, leaving only the 358MW Estlink 1 in operation between the two countries, operator Fingrid said.


Twelve Western countries on Dec 16 said they had agreed on measures to "disrupt and deter" Russia's so-called shadow fleet of vessels in order to prevent sanctions breaches and increase the cost to Moscow of the war in Ukraine.


"We must be able to prevent the risks posed by ships belonging to the Russian shadow fleet," Finnish President Alexander Stubb said in a post on social media X on Thursday.

Lithuanian foreign minister Kestutis Budrys said the growing number of Baltic Sea incidents should serve as a stark and urgent warning to NATO and the European Union to significantly enhance the protection of undersea infrastructure there.


Police in Sweden are leading an investigation into the breach last month of two Baltic Sea telecom cables, an incident German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius has said he assumed was caused by sabotage.


Separately, Finnish and Estonian police continue to investigate damage caused last year to the Balticconnector gas pipeline linking Finland and Estonia, as well as several telecom cables, and have said this was likely caused by a ship dragging its anchor.


In 2022 the Russia-to-Germany Nord Stream gas pipelines running along the seabed in the same waters were blown up, in a case still under investigation by Germany.

Finland boards oil tanker suspected of causing internet, power cable outages - CNA

Miles-long anchor drag mark found on Baltic seabed after suspicious cable damage, Finnish investigators say

Finnish investigators probing the damage to a Baltic Sea power cable and several data cables said they found an anchor drag mark on the seabed, apparently from a Russia-linked vessel that has already been seized.


The discovery heightened concerns about suspected sabotage by Russia’s “shadow fleet” of fuel tankers – aging vessels with obscure ownership acquired to evade Western sanctions amid the war in Ukraine and operating without Western-regulated insurance.


The Estlink-2 power cable, which transmits energy from Finland to Estonia across the Baltic Sea, went down on Dec. 25 after a rupture. It had little impact on services but followed damage to two data cables and the Nord Stream gas pipelines, both of which have been termed sabotage.


Finnish police chief investigator Sami Paila said late Sunday the anchor drag trail continued for “dozens of kilometers (miles) … if not almost 100 kilometers (62 miles).”


Paila added to Finnish national TV broadcaster Yle: “Our current understanding is that the drag mark in question is that of the anchor of the (seized) Eagle S vessel. We have been able to clarify this matter through underwater research.”


Without giving further details, Paila said authorities have “a preliminary understanding of what happened at sea, how the anchor mark was created there,” and stressed that the “question of intent is a completely essential issue to be clarified in the preliminary investigation.”


On Saturday, the seized vessel was escorted to anchorage in the vicinity of the port of Porvoo to facilitate the investigation, officials said. It is being probed under criminal charges of aggravated interference with telecommunications, aggravated vandalism and aggravated regulatory offense.


The Eagle S is flagged in the Cook Islands but was described by Finnish customs officials and the European Union executive commission as part of Russia’s shadow fleet of fuel tankers. Russia’s use of the vessels has raised environmental concerns about accidents given their age and uncertain insurance coverage.


In the wake of the cable rupture, NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte said last week that the military alliance, which Finland joined last year, will step up patrols in the Baltic Sea region.


The Finnish Coast Guard said Monday that another tanker ship headed for a Russian port has engine failure and drifted, then anchored in the Gulf of Finland south of the Hanko Paninsula. The guard said it was notified Sunday night.


Registered in Panama, the M/T Jazz was en route to Primorsk, Russia, from Sudan, with apparently no oil cargo. Finnish authorities have dispatched a tugboat and a patrol ship to ensure that the vessel does not drift and to prevent any damage to the environment.


Regional director of the Coast Guard Janne Ryönänkoski said there was no immediate risk to the seabed infrastructure.


Earlier Monday, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said that “sabotage in Europe has increased” since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.


Kallas told the German newspaper Welt that the recent “sabotage attempts in the Baltic Sea are not isolated incidents” but “part of a pattern of deliberate and coordinated actions to damage our digital and energy infrastructure.”


She vowed that the EU would “take stronger measures to counter the risks posed” by vessels of Russia’s shadow fleet.


Finland, which shares a 1,340-kilometer (832-mile) border with Russia, abandoned its decades-long policy of neutrality and joined NATO in 2023, amid Russia’s war against Ukraine.

Miles-long anchor drag mark found on Baltic seabed after suspicious cable damage, Finnish investigators say