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Russia trains dolphins to defend its fleet from Ukraine attacks
Following a string of counter-offensive raids on Crimean ports, Moscow has doubled the number of its marine mammals in Sevastopol
Russia has doubled the number of specially trained dolphins deployed to defend its Black Sea Fleet from Ukrainian attacks.
Dolphin pens have been spotted by the entrance to the Sevastopol harbour since the early days of the war, with the animals there to stop Ukrainian divers from infiltrating the naval base and sabotaging the Kremlin’s warships.
But Moscow has now doubled the number of dolphins at the harbour’s entrances, according to Naval News.
There are now as many as seven dolphins patrolling the waters around the harbour, the website reported, up from an estimated three to four animals at the start of the war.
The dolphins are part of a layered defensive system that includes torpedo nets, a floating barrier and anti-aircraft missiles.
Russia’s Black Sea dolphin unit was set up during the Cold War and came under Ukrainian control with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Following the 2014 annexation of Crimea, however, it once again became part of the Russian navy.
“Our specialists developed new devices that convert dolphins’ underwater sonar detection of targets into a signal to the operator’s monitor,” a source told Russian news agency RIA Novosti last year. “The Ukrainian navy lacked funds for such know-how, and some projects had to be mothballed.”
Marine experts say dolphins have the most accurate sonar known to science, which makes it relatively simple for them to find mines and other threats underwater. They are also able to outswim any diver.
The Russian navy has long had a marine mammal programme, but the increased number of dolphins comes after a series of Ukrainian drone attacks targeting the Black Sea Fleet.
In October, Ukrainian drone boats attacked the Sevastopol Naval Base, with Western analysts believing they were able to hit at least three ships.
Videos shared on social media in the aftermath of the attack appeared to show damage to the Admiral Makarov, which became the Black Sea Fleet’s flagship after the sinking of the Moskva.
Several countries around the world are believed to have marine mammal programmes, including the United States, which has trained dolphins to detect mines, swimmers and retrieve objects.
Russia reportedly sent its Black Sea dolphins to its Syrian naval base in the port of Tartus in 2018.
And in 2019, a beluga whale wearing a harness was discovered in Norway that was widely thought to belong to the Russian navy.