Finland detains Russia-linked tanker after latest Baltic Sea cables incident

Finnish authorities have detained a tanker suspected of being involved in the damage of a subsea power cable connecting Finland and Estonia and disruptions of several data cables.

The police and border guard boarded the Cook Islands-flagged LR1 tanker Eagle S carrying oil from Russia to Egypt after the 170-km-long, 650 MW Estlink 2 broke down on Wednesday. This is the latest in a series of incidents involving cables and pipelines in the Baltic Sea. Estonian media reports that four underwater telecommunications cables have also been experiencing disruptions.

Finnish authorities told reporters on Thursday that following an initial investigation, the 2006-built 74,000 dwt tanker was observed to be missing its anchor, adding that the anchor was the likely cause of the cable damage. The vessel, previously known as Norstar Intrepid has been tied to Russia’s shadow fleet and India’s Peninsular Maritime and Dubai-based one-ship outfit Caravella as owner.

At least two vessels were spotted in the vicinity during the incident, the head of operations of the Finnish utility Fingrid, Arto Pahkin, told local media. One of the vessels was the 2007-built 2,400 teu boxship Xin Xin Tian 2, owned by China’s Hainan Yangpu and operated by compatriot line NewNew Shipping.

The Baltic Sea has witnessed multiple disruptions of power cables, telecom links, and gas pipelines in the past two years. A series of underwater explosions ruptured the Nord Stream pipelines that carried Russian gas to Europe in September 2022. An undersea gas pipeline between Finland and Estonia was shut down after the anchor of the NewNew Polar Bear, another containership operated by NewNew Shipping, damaged it in October 2023. In November, two data cables, one running between Finland and Germany and another between Lithuania and Sweden, were also cut.

Finnish president Alexander Stubb called for ruling out the risks posed by Russian shadow fleet vessels, reacting in a post on X to the incident.

Estonian foreign minister Margus Tsahkna said damage to vital underwater infrastructure has become so frequent that it is hard to believe it was a coincidence or just bad seamanship, adding: “We must understand that damage to the undersea infrastructure has become systemic and must be treated as attacks on our essential infrastructure.”