"The repairs and modernization of cruiser Marshal Ustinov at the Zvezdochka shipyard have been finished. The ship is undergoing sea trials. In the fourth quarter of 2016 the ship will be transferred to its permanent base," Igor Ponomarev told RIA Novosti.
The Slava-class cruisers were designed as surface strike ships with some anti-air and ASW capability, and have a primary armament of sixteen SS-N-12 Sandbox nuclear-capable supersonic anti-ship missiles. The Marshal Ustinov, a Slava-class missile cruiser, was launched in 1982 and commissioned with the Russian Northern Fleet in 1986.
Marshal Ustinov had been undergoing modernization since 2011. The completion of the work, which included repairs of the propulsion system and overhaul of the ship’s missile, communications and navigation systems, was originally scheduled for 2014. However, diagnostics revealed that the majority of electrical cables on the vessel must be replaced, leading to further delays.
