Russia expands shadow fleet to circumvent sanctions on gas exports – media

Russia continues to expand its shadow fleet for transporting liquefied natural gas, which is under US sanctions. Four more tankers previously owned by Oman have been added to the transports.

Bloomberg writes about this.

According to monitoring services, one of the tankers – “Kosmos” – has moored at the floating storage facility “Saam” near Murmansk and has probably already loaded Russian LNG.

Three more vessels – “Merkury”, “Orion” and “Promin” – have either already received fuel from the “Saama” or are preparing to load.

The Saam storage facility itself is used to store gas from the Russian Arctic LNG 2 project, which is under US sanctions.

Due to the difficult conditions in the Arctic, for most of the year this gas can only be transported by special icebreaker vessels, so the shortage of tankers has long remained a problem for Russian exports.

According to the agency, the tanker “Kosmos” transferred to the Russian flag and changed its name in early 2026.

The tanker “Merkury”, which was loaded in May, is likely headed to Asian countries. At the same time, “Orion” and “Promin” are moving towards the floating gas storage facility.

Bloomberg notes that Russia now has at least 20 tankers to transport sanctioned LNG. The new vessels could help Moscow increase exports amid high demand for gas in Asia and rising prices due to reduced supplies through the Strait of Hormuz.

It should be noted that the vessels of the Russian shadow fleet use Starlink satellite terminals to coordinate oil transportation and circumvent international sanctions.

Recall that in January, China increased imports of Russian oil through tankers of the so-called shadow fleet , while India significantly reduced purchases.