ST. PETERSBURG, June 16. /TASS/. The Baltic Shipyard in St. Petersburg has floated out the hull of what will become the world’s largest and most powerful twin-reactor icebreaker, The Arktika, a TASS correspondent reports from the scene of the event.

Taking part in the gala ceremony were Federation Council Speaker Valentina Matviyenko, head of the Rosatom corporation, Sergey Kiriyenko, Federation Council Member, president of the State Polar Academy Artur Chilingarov, president of the United Shipbuilding Corporation Aleksey Rakhmanov and others.

"The Arktika’s launch is a victory in all senses," Rosatom chief Sergey Kiriyenko said. "Today we can say that by the end of 2017 this icebreaker will join Rosatomflot. This will open up fundamentally new opportunities in front of our country in terms of maintaining the national defenses and year-round navigation in the Arctic and ensuring economic development in a region that is of crucial importance to Russia and the whole world."