Metre-deep craters and a debris field on the seabed: An investigation by the operating company reveals for the first time the full extent of the damage to the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline. It is therefore destroyed over a length of 250 metres.

A good five weeks after leaks were discovered on the Nord Stream 1 pipeline in the Baltic Sea, the operator’s first investigation report is available. According to Nord Stream AG, a tube of the double strand was destroyed over a length of around 250 metres.

In a section in Swedish waters, three to five-meter-deep craters were discovered on the seabed. The craters are about 248 meters apart. Nord Stream AG announced that the section of line 1 of the pipeline in between had been destroyed. Debris from the line was distributed within a radius of at least 250 metres. The data would be further examined.

Last week, Nord Stream AG announced investigations in the Swedish Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). Therefore, approval from the authorities was lacking for assessing the damage in the Danish EEZ. A special vessel was sent to one of the spots in Swedish waters where leaks were suspected.

At the end of September, four leaks in the gas pipelines Nord Stream 1 and 2 were discovered after explosions near the Baltic Sea island of Bornholm, two of them in the exclusive economic zones of Denmark and Sweden. Both double strands run from Russia to Lubmin in north-eastern Germany. Russia had pumped gas from Siberia to Germany and other European countries through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline until the delivery stopped.

Both Denmark and Sweden concluded that explosions caused the leaks at the Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 pipelines. So far, it is unclear who might be behind it, and the EU and NATO, among others, assume sabotage.

Image by The Russian Presidential Press and Information Office (Wikimedia)/Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)