



A veteran of the Cold War and a recent participant in Russian operations off Syria has been sent to the bottom of the Black Sea by a boat full of sheep. The 47-year-old Russian intelligence collection ship, the Liman, sank on April 27 after a collision in the Black Sea with a Togo-flagged livestock carrier carrying sheep from Romania to Jordan. The sheep-carrying Youzarsif H suffered only slight damage to its bow, but the Liman suffered a rupture in its hull below the waterline.

Designated by the Russian Navy as a "medium reconnaissance ship" ("Средний разведывательный корабль"), the Liman was smaller than more recently constructed, purpose-built intelligence ships like the Leonov (the spy ship that traveled up the US East Coast in February). Originally built as a hydrographic survey ship in 1970, it was converted in 1989 into a signals-intelligence collection ship, a class of vessels known in US naval parlance as AGIs (auxiliary, general intelligence). The conversion added passive underwater acoustic sensors along with electronic warfare equipment for collecting radio and radar signals.

During the Soviet era, AGIs—many of them converted fishing trawlers—would frequently shadow US and other NATO member naval forces to intercept their signals, including sonar and radar signatures. Occasionally they would even break in on unencrypted ship-to-ship frequencies, using NATO signals to attempt to collect more information about ship formations or even disrupt their operations. While slow, they would often position themselves in groups around US aircraft carrier operations in the Mediterranean, Atlantic, and Pacific.

Built in Gdansk, Poland, the Liman initially served with the Soviet Northern Fleet, conducting underwater survey operations and making port calls as far afield as India, Cuba, Canada, and the United States. The Liman was transferred to the Black Sea Fleet in 1979, and, after its conversion to a signals intelligence ship, it regularly conducted long cruises in the Mediterranean, shadowing US and NATO forces and performing coastal signals collection patrols. In 1999, the Liman was sent at the request of Serbian President Slobodan Milošević to monitor NATO's airstrike operations during the war in Kosovo. More recently, the ship has seen service off Syria.

While collisions at sea are a perpetual threat, it's exceedingly rare for a naval vessel to sink after a collision. Admiral Viktor Kravchenko, a former Black Sea Fleet commander, called the sinking "out of the ordinary" in an interview with Interfax. "There have been collisions," he said, "but I do not remember a case like this, of a vessel, a warship sinking after it."

The last major incident in which a US Navy ship sank as the result of a collision was in 1969, when the destroyer USS Frank E Evans was run over by the Australian carrier HMAS Melbourne; the ship was cut in half, and its bow sank with 74 sailors. The stern stayed afloat, and 199 other sailors were rescued.

Listing image by A.Brichevskogo