Esperanza on the River Thames off Gravesend, England, August 2010.
History
Soviet Union
Name	Vikhr-4[2]
Operator	Northern Fleet
Builder	Stocznia Północna, Gdansk, Poland
Yard number	B98/04[1]
Launched	1984
Renamed	1998
Fate	Sold to Greenpeace
Netherlands
Name	Esperanza
Owner	Stichting Phoenix Maastricht
Operator	Greenpeace
Port of registry	Amsterdam, Netherlands
Acquired	2000
Recommissioned	2002
Out of service	2022
Identification	IMO number: 8404599 MMSI number: 244690000 Callsign: PD 6464
Fate	Scrapped in Gijón, Spain, 2022
Notes	Former names: Vikhr-4, Echo Fighter, Eco Fighter
General characteristics
Class and type	Built as Type B98 expedition/research ship
Tonnage	2,076 GT
Length	72.3 m (237 ft 2 in) o/a
Beam	14.3 m (46 ft 11 in)
Draft	4.7 m (15 ft 5 in)
Ice class	1A
Propulsion	2 × 2,938 bhp (2,191 kW) Sulzer V12 engines
Speed	18.8 knots (34.8 km/h; 21.6 mph)
Range	19,000 nmi (35,000 km; 22,000 mi)
Boats & landing craft carried	2 large and 3 small rigid-hulled inflatable boats (RHIB)
Crew	33
Aviation facilities	Helipad

MV Esperanza was a ship operated by Greenpeace. Previous to being a Greenpeace ship it was a fire-fighting vessel owned by the Soviet Navy, built in 1984. It was recommissioned in 2000 and relaunched in 2002 after being named Esperanza ('hope' in Spanish) by visitors to the Greenpeace website. It had undergone a major refit by Greenpeace to make it more environmentally friendly. A new helicopter deck and boat cranes were also added. The ship was powered by two Sulzer V12 marine diesel engines.

The ship had a heavy ice class,^[3] giving it the ability to work in polar regions. It had a top speed of 16 knots (30 km/h; 18 mph) and an overall length of 72.3 metres (237 ft 2 in). This made it the fastest and largest of the Greenpeace fleet.^[3]

Original painted in blue livery, during December 2014 it called at Palumbo Malta Superyachts for repairs and a new livery, acquiring a green hull like other Greenpeace vessels.

Esperanza has been involved in many world wide campaigns, protecting environment and wildlife. She was decommissioned and sold for scrap in 2022.

Video equipment aboard

Greenpeace added live webcams to the Esperanza in 2006. The webcams are positioned on the bow of the ship, the mast and the bridge, they send a new image every minute to their Defending Our Oceans website and provide an archive of action.

In April 2006, the Esperanza was equipped with state-of-the-art underwater monitoring equipment, including a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) which can shoot video down to a depth of 300 metres (980 ft), and a drop camera capable of reaching depths of 1,000 metres (3,300 ft).

Operational career

The Esperanza participated in fishery patrols with Kiribati and the Marshall Islands in 2006.^[4] In January 2017, the ship launched an ROV off the Atlantic Coast of Brazil to help document the largely unknown Amazon Reef in advance of planned developments by oil companies.

In 2020 the Esperanza sailed the Protect the Oceans campaign, a voyage from the Arctic to the Antarctic. This almost year-long voyage was one of Greenpeace’s biggest ever expeditions and highlighted the many threats the oceans are facing. ^[5]

With Greenpeace’s vision for a zero-carbon future, it was decided to retire the Esperanza. Early 2022 she was decommissioned and sold for scrap to Spain. Her last voyage she sailed 7 February 2022 from her homeport Amsterdam to Bilbao. Then from Bilbao to Gijón where she arrived 12 February 2022, to be dismantled and recycled. ^[6]