“Ukraine will need up to five years to dispose of four hundred mines in the Black Sea. In addition, the help of other Black Sea countries is needed. This was said at a briefing in Media Center Ukraine by the spokesman of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, captain 3rd rank Dmytro Pletenchuk. He explained the differences between demining at sea and on land, and the complexity of demining at sea. “Ahead awaits us”, — write on: ua.news
Ukraine will need up to five years to dispose of four hundred mines in the Black Sea. In addition, the help of other Black Sea countries is needed.
This was said at a briefing in Media Center Ukraine by the spokesman of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, captain 3rd rank Dmytro Pletenchuk.
He explained the differences between demining at sea and on land, and the complexity of demining at sea.
“Ahead of us is a serious demining operation of the Black Sea – that’s four hundred mines. Demining at sea is very different from demining on land, where there is only one plane and two coordinates, and in the sea there are three, because there is still depth. On land, mines are in a static position, and in the sea the situation is dynamic – if a storm breaks the mine from the frame, it begins to drift and can move along the bottom. As a result of Russian detonation of the Kakhovskaya HPP, in addition to sea mines, anchored river mines, anti-landing mines, conventional mines, which mined both banks of the Dnieper, entered the water area of the Dnipro-Buzka estuary and the Black Sea. Therefore, the situation there is not easy,” Pletenchuk explained.
Demining will take place in several phases, the main phase of which may last up to 5 years.
“The first phase of the anti-mine operation will last from 3 to 7 months – it is the demining of the places where ships and ports are parked. Let me remind you that the ports of Kherson and Mykolaiv remain blocked in our country, in particular, due to the danger of mines and Russian control of the Kinburn spit. Then, the main phase of demining most of the sea will last from 3 to 5 years. Unfortunately, the sea will periodically throw up surprises in the future,” said Pletenchuk.
He also expressed hope for the participation of Ukraine’s partner countries in the Black Sea region in demining and noted that such cooperation is already taking place.
“All these explosive objects reach the Romanian and Bulgarian shores, the Turkish Straits and even the Georgian coast. So we hope that some anti-mine group will join the demining. For example, in Europe there are two such groups – in the Baltic Sea and in the Mediterranean Sea. We hope that our partners — Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Georgia — will take part in the full-scale demining operation. Now we already have interaction and cooperation, which concerns the training of specialists who carry out this demining every day. These teams are constantly working, checking the fairways,” Pletenchuk explained.
Turkey, Romania and Bulgaria have already started joint anti-mine operations in the Black Sea. So the countries want to help increase the safety of shipping, in particular, for Ukrainian grain exports.
Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey have called on other countries to join the initiative to clear the Black Sea of mines and ensure the safety of sea routes.
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