Russian LNG Tanker Marshal Vasilevskiy Armed with Machine Guns

The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) reported that Russian LNG tanker Marshal Vasilevskiy have been armed with heavy machine guns.

Vessel MARSHAL VASILEVSKIY, image credit: Estonian police and the Border Guard

The surveillance photographs obtained by Estonian police and the Border Guard in the month of May. According to OCCRP the vessel has been equipped with two 12.7mm Kord heavy machine guns mounted near the bridge. It is yet not known the purpose of the installation of these guns aboard the vessel.

Owned by Russia's state-controlled energy company Gazprom, Marshal Vasilevskiy is not under sanctions and is not believed to be part of Russia's shadow fleet.

The Marshal Vasilevskiy is a Russian civilian tanker that transports liquefied natural gas (LNG) between Bolshoy Bor on mainland Russia and Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea. The tanker is also equipped with onboard regasification technology that can convert LNG back into natural gas for direct supply. Moreover, the vessel can also store LNG and discharge it as liquefied cargo when required, giving it the flexibility to operate as both an LNG carrier and a floating regasification unit.

Although the heavy weapons are lethal at long ranges, they are not well-suited for defending against naval or aerial drones. Operating them also requires specialized training that most civilian sailors lack.

OCCRP also reported that the 288-meters-long vessel has additionally been carrying around 50 "passengers," 22 of whom have been identified as having military backgrounds through passenger lists and open-source checks.