At the time of the accident on EstLink 2, a vessel of the Russian “shadow fleet” was passing by

Fingrid control room manager Arto Pahkin told news portal Yle that the cause of the damage was being studied and the possibility of terrorism or vandalism could not be ruled out. According to him, when the electrical connection was broken, there were two ships above the cable, but he did not specify their names.

Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet reported that the Cook Islands-flagged tanker Eagle S was near the cable when the connection was lost. According to the Marinetraffic service, the tanker slowed down at approximately the same time when the cable damage was detected. On Thursday morning, the Finnish patrol ship Turva escorted Eagle S to the Finnish coast near Porkkala.

According to open sources, the Eagle S tanker was traveling from St. Petersburg to Egypt. According to the British publication Lloyd’s List, the ship is part of Russia’s so-called “shadow fleet”, transporting oil under sanctions. This is the only ship of the Caravella company registered in the UAE. In July, British media noted that the 20-year-old tanker, in poor condition, posed an environmental threat.

According to Lloyd’s List, the shadow fleet refers to ships over 15 years old with an unknown owner, whose task is to transport oil from countries under sanctions and use methods of maritime circumvention of sanctions.

The Iltalehti newspaper adds that at the time of the accident there was another ship near the cable – the Hong Kong-flagged container ship Xin Xin Tian 2. Aftonbladet reports that the Xin Xin Tian 2 is a similar vessel to the Newnew Polar Bear, which damaged the Balticconnector gas pipeline in October 2023. However, Yle data shows that the container ship crossed the cable 8 minutes before the incident.

The investigation is ongoing.

Cable accident

• Repair work after a previous accident on EstLink 2 in Lääne-Viru County was completed by the end of summer Photo: Elering

While police are investigating, system operators in both countries – Elering and Fingrid – are working to identify the source of the problem as quickly as possible.

Elering has assured that Estonia’s energy supply remains stable. Until January 26, reserve local power is used to compensate for the electricity that should have been supplied via EstLink 2. If the elimination of the fault is delayed, from December 27, other energy capacities in the region will begin to be used to replace EstLink 2.

The previous EstLink 2 outage occurred at the end of January. The cause was a fault at a coastal station in Estonia, which required replacing about 300 meters of cable and connecting it to the existing line. Work to install the offshore couplings was completed in August, and the onshore connection was restored in early September.

EstLink 2 with a capacity of 650 megawatts began operation in 2014. Until the latest failure, it was considered one of the most reliable DC lines in the Baltic Sea region. At the same time, the EstLink 1 line with a capacity of 350 megawatts continues to operate without interruption.

The EstLink 2 line consists of converter stations in Estonia and Finland, as well as more than 170 kilometers of cables: about 12 kilometers of land lines in Estonia, 147 kilometers of submarine cables at the bottom of the Gulf of Finland and 14 kilometers of overhead lines in Finland.