Northern Fleet Takes New Survival Suit in Service

12.11.2012 The newest Russian-made hydro/thermo survival suit GTSK is fielded at Northern Fleet (NF); the suit is capable to conserve human body heat for a long time even in icy water.

GTSK is supposed to replace foreign-made wet suit ?R?/40 which was adopted by Northern Fleet in mid-90's as life preserver and has expired service life.

The new Russian survival suit is ideal wear for polar water temperatures. In addition, it is 30% warmer than it is required by the International Life-Saving Appliances Code.

The suit is equipped with light-reflecting stripes facilitating search in the water in nighttime, hoist slings and fastening belts, electric flare and alarm whistle.

One of distinctive feature of GTSK is a special foam cushion designed for keeping positive buoyancy and obviating the need for additional rescue aids like life vest.

As of today, there are over 200 survival suits GTSK at Northern Fleet units. With the beginning of bulk deliveries in 2013, it is planned to make this suit one of the main personal escape facility at all types of NF submarines, rescue ships, and auxiliary vessels.

Early in Nov 2012, the survival suit was demonstrated at two-day drills held in the NF main base Severomorsk under direction of Capt 1 Rank Vladimir Gorban, the chief of NF Search and Rescue Dept. GTSK was presented there as a prospective life-saving asset for crews of surface ships, submarines, and civil vessels being in distress in Arctic seas.