OVERVIEW: The Yug class Intelligence Gathering Ship (AGI) is a two-shaft, diesel-powered radar picket vessel.

DETAILS:   The Yug class (Project 862) is a Intelligence Gathering Ship (AGI). Designated as an Communications Vessel (Sudno Svyazey)(SSV) . Eighteen of these ships were built for the USSR by the Northern Shipyard in Gdansk, Poland between 1977 and 1983. During peacetime, they rotate duties between naval intelligence collection and civilian scientific research/oceanography. An exception is the unnamed ship which is a full-time military intelligence ship. This vessel was originally numbered SSV-328 (as above), in 1995 she changed numbers to SSV-704. During the Cold War, these ships could be found worldwide. Now they are mostly limited to the Baltic. Few are now active at the same time and some may have been decommissioned. 

Names are Donuzlav, V. Adm. Vorontsov (ex-Briz), Gals, Gidrolog, Gorizont, Persey, Pegas, Nikolay Matusevich, Marshall Gelovani, Mangyshlak, Pluton, Senezh, Strelets, Stvor, Zodiak, Vizir, Tayga, and one unnamed unit.


NOTES: Displacement: 2,700 tons full load
       Speed: 15.5 knts
       Range: 9,000 nm @ 12 knts
       Complement: 46 crew 
       In Commission: 1977.   
       Vessels in class: 18
 

SOURCES: Norman Polmar, "Guide to the Soviet Navy, 3rd ed. (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1983); Gardiner, R. (Ed.). (1983), pg 283 ; http://www.harpoondatabases.com/encyclopedia/Entry908.aspx