Ropucha-class landing ship
The Project 775, NATO reporting name Ropucha class (Polish for Toad), is a class of landing ship (large landing ship in Soviet classification) built in Poland for the Soviet Navy. The ships were built in the Stocznia Północna shipyards in Gdańsk, Poland. They were designed for beach landings, and can carry a 450-ton cargo. The ships have both bow- and stern-doors for loading and unloading vehicles, and the  of vehicle deck stretches the length of the hull. Up to 25 armored personnel carriers can be embarked. While designed for roll-on/roll-off operations, they can also be loaded using dockside cranes. For this purpose there is a long sliding hatch-cover above the bow section for access to the vehicle deck. There are no facilities for helicopters. In total, 28 ships of this type were commissioned from 1975 to 1991. The last three ships were of the improved variant Project 775M, also called Ropucha II. These have improved defensive armament and accommodation for a greater number of troops. Operational history

Most of the ships became part of the Russian Navy after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. They were used for landing troops at the Georgian port of Poti during the 2008 South Ossetia war and for deliveries of cargo during the Russian military intervention in the Syrian civil war. One ship of the class was delivered to South Yemen in 1979 and served the Yemeni Navy until 2002, before it was sold as a civilian cargo named Sam of Yemen. It was the only unit of this class in service outside the former Soviet Union. On 3 August 2012, international media reported that three vessels of the class, Aleksandr Otrakovskiy, Georgiy Pobedonosets and Kondopoga would visit the Russian naval base in Tartus, Syria. The ships were part of the Northern Fleet. Earlier reports, quoting a source at the Russian general staff, said the ships would spend a few days in Tartus and would take on fresh supplies of food and water. British media added that the ships each had up to 120 marines on board. The Russian defence ministry left open the possibility that the ships might dock there at some point for logistical reasons, saying they had every right to do so. The General Staff source, who was not named, had said that after calling in at Tartus they would head for the Bosporus and the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiysk. From 2013 on, ten Ropucha-class ships, gathered from all four Russian fleets, were used to transport military equipment from Novorosiysk to Tartus in Syria, during an intervention in Syrian civil war, along with Ropucha-class ships. All ships of the Russia's Black Sea Fleet, namely , Novocherkassk, Yamal and Azov were modernized with installation of the Tsentavr-NM2S, Auriga and Cobham SAILOR satellite phones. Operations during the Russo-Ukrainian War

The Ukrainian Navy's only ship of the class, Kostiantyn Olshansky, was seized by Russian troops and accepted into service with the Russian Navy after the Annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation in March 2014. In February 2022 prior to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, the landing ships Korolev, , Kaliningrad, Pyotr Morgunov, Georgy Pobedonosets, and Olenegorsky Gornyak  from the Baltic and Northern fleets departed their bases and passed through the Dardanelles Strait for exercises in the Black Sea. In early August 2023, Olenegorsky Gornyak was seriously damaged at the Black Sea Novorossiysk naval base after it was struck by a Ukrainian maritime drone carrying  of TNT. The ship was pictured under tow, listing 40–50 degrees to port as tugboats worked to put it in a safe position. On 13 September 2023, Russian military reported that the Sevastopol Shipyard had been struck by an Ukrainian missile attack, damaging the Ropucha-class landing ship Minsk and the  Rostov-on-Don. The UK Ministry of Defence assessed Minsk as being "functionally destroyed" as a result of the attack with a greater than 95% probability. Ships

See also
 List of ships of the Soviet Navy
 List of ships of Russia by project number
 List of active Russian Navy ships

References

Sources

External links

 Russian Littoral Warfare Ships at Hazegray.org
 Yemeni Navy at Hazegray.org
 All Ropucha Class Landing Ships - Complete Ship List at Russianships.info

Amphibious warfare vessel classes
 Ropucha class landing ship
Poland–Soviet Union relations
Amphibious warfare vessels of the Soviet Navy
Amphibious warfare vessels of the Russian Navy
Naval ships built in Poland for export