Väinämöinen

History: Väinämöinen was a Finnish coastal defence ship, the sister ship of the Finnish Navy's flagship Ilmarinen and also the first ship of her class. She was built at the Crichton-Vulcan shipyard in Turku and was launched in 1932. Following the end of the Continuation War, Väinämöinen was handed over to the Soviet Union as war reparations and renamed Vyborg.[i] The ship remained in Soviet hands until her scrapping in 1966.

Class: These two ships were built at the Crichton-Vulcan shipyard in Turku and were launched in 1932 and 1933. Väinämöinen and Ilmarinen were planned to be mobile coastal fortresses for the defence of the Finnish demilitarized islands at Åland in particular. The two ships were not well suited for the open seas due design with emphasis on operations on shallow waters in archipelago: it has been said that they were volatile and rolled too much. The minimal depth keel, together with the high conning tower, made the ships' movements slow and wide. It was said that the ships were uncomfortable, but harmless to their crews.

The ship's heavy armament of 254-millimetre (10 in) Bofors guns could fire shells of 255 kilograms (562 lb) up to 31 kilometres (19 mi). The fire control and the lining of the gun towers were connected electrically and the values and commands could be given without spoken contact. With the aid of mechanical calculators, the values were transferred directly to the gun towers.

Nationality: Finland is a Northern European nation bordering Sweden, Norway and Russia. Its capital, Helsinki, occupies a peninsula and surrounding islands in the Baltic Sea. Helsinki is home to the 18th-century sea fortress Suomenlinna, the fashionable Design District and diverse museums. The Northern Lights can be seen from the country's Arctic Lapland province, a vast wilderness with national parks and ski resorts.