This was a claim submitted by Federal State Unitary Enterprise ‘Rosmorport’ (the claimant) for the recovery of a debt of RUB 28,859,930.33 against Tigroil LLC, the owner of the oil tanker Tigr-1 (the defendant).

By the order of the harbour master of the port of Magadan, the period of mandatory ice pilotage commenced on 10 December 2017. During this period, all the operations within the port limits of the seaport Magadan should have been conducted with the assistance of the icebreaker Magadan, or without its assistance only by separate order of the harbour master. Any vessels with defective power plants or steering could not navigate without the assistance of the Magadan in any event.

On 29 March 2018, the defendant sent the claimant several letters asking the claimant to provide individual ice channelling for the Tigr-1 due to the fact that the main engine of the vessel was defective and could not reach its full capacity. The claimant accepted the offer and informed the defendant that it could provide assistance to the Tigr-1. However, it added that the Magadan might be not enough for successful channelling, and therefore, they would use another icebreaker, the Krasin. The defendant accepted these terms.

On the same day, the claimant received a telegram from the governor of the Magadan region, which stated that the Tigr-1 drifted due to failure of its main engine. The governor stated that due to the weather conditions, the vessel created a danger to its own crew and other ships. Further, the Tigr-1 was crucial for the Magadan region since it provided several towns with the oil needed for the cold season. Therefore, the governor requested the claimant to provide urgent assistance to the Tigr-1.

Both the Magadan and the Krasin rendered ice channelling services to the defendant from 30-31 March 2018. The parties did not enter into a written contract, but in the correspondence, the claimant indicated the prices per day of the use of the icebreakers. The defendant did not pay for the services rendered by the icebreakers.

The Court of first instance found in favour of the claimant in part. It stated that the parties concluded a contract for services of ice channelling. Thus, the relations between them should have been regulated by this contract in terms of the quotes provided by the claimant in its correspondence. On the basis of the evidence provided by both parties, the Court of first instance determined the actual time of ice channelling and concluded that the justified amount of the debt was RUB 8,810,730.43.

The claimant appealed.

Held: The appeal is partially upheld. The judgment of the Court of first instance is amended.

One of the claimant's arguments was that the services rendered to the defendant were, in fact, a salvage operation since the vessel could not navigate by itself due to the defects of its main engine, and that is why the services of the second icebreaker Krasin were needed. Also, the actions of the claimant had a useful result, because the Tigr-1 reached the port of Vladivostok.

The Court of Appeal disagreed with this argument. It held that under art 377 of the Merchant Shipping Code of Russia, salvage operations mean the actions taken to save a ship or other property in danger. At the same time, the circumstances of the case do not demonstrate that the Tigr-1 was in danger. The main engine did not fail completely, but had some defects which did not allow it to reach its full capacity. Therefore, it could not navigate in ice, but could navigate in general. The vessel did not make distress calls. There was no available information on the incidents in the sea that occurred in connection with the operation of the Tigr-1 from 25 March-2 April 2018. Thus, the evidence provided by the claimant did not prove that the vessel was in imminent danger. Therefore, it was impossible to characterise the services rendered as salvage.

[Judgment confirmed on cassation appeal: see the Judgment of the Commercial Court of the Far Eastern District in Case No A51-18447/2018 dated 10/07/2020.]