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Aircraft carrier blunders
07/05/2009Head of the Sevmash yard in Severodvinsk in last week's meeting with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev admitted that his company had made several blunders in the reconstruction process of the aircraft carrier Admiral Gorshkov.
The vessel, which has been bought by the Indian Navy, will at the earliest be completed in late 2012.
President Medvedev in his visit to the yard yesterday expressed major dissatisfaction with Sevmash' handling of the aircraft carrier. According to a Russian-Indian agreement from 2004, the upgraded vessel was to be sold to the Indian Navy for 617 million USD, Rossiiskaya Gazeta reports. Now the price for the job is estimated to more than 2 billion USD.
Sevmash has already admitted that the aircraft carrier is a loss project for the yard.
In the meeting with Medvedev, Sevmash General Director Nikolai Kalistratov confirmed that "very much work remains with the aircraft carrier" and that his yard had made numerous blunders in the construction process.
At the same time, Mr. Kalistratov criticized the Indians for having raised their requirements from Sevmash. – They wanted a Lada, and now they demand a Mercedes, he told the president.
Medvedev meanwhile stressed that the vessel must be completed and that the job must be seen as a test for Sevmash. –This is a question of prestige, he underlined, adding that the ship is of importance for the yard's future.
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