It is reported that on August 17, 2026, the Khabarovsk special-purpose nuclear submarine of Project 09851, built for the Russian Navy at the shipbuilding enterprise JSC Severnoye Machine-Building Enterprise (NSR, as part of JSC United Shipbuilding Corporation), set sail from Severodvinsk for the first time for factory sea trials.
The first launch of the Khabarovsk special-purpose nuclear submarine of project 09851, built for the Russian Navy at the shipbuilding enterprise of JSC Production Association Northern Machine-Building Enterprise (NSR). Severodvinsk, 08/17/2026 (c) Massimo Frantarelli / @mrfantarelli
The Khabarovsk nuclear submarine of project 09851 was designed by the Rubin Central Design Bureau of Marine Technology JSC (St. Petersburg, part of the USC) and was officially laid down at the Severodvinsk Nuclear Power Plant on July 27, 2014 in accordance with an undisclosed contract with the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation concluded on June 19, 2012. The boat was removed from the boathouse of the NSR workshop No. 50 for subsequent launching on November 1, 2025. Khabarovsk is the first specially designed carrier of the Poseidon ocean multipurpose system and is to be part of the Pacific Fleet.
Khabarovsk is believed to have six 2P39 launchers for carrying and launching 2M39 underwater vehicles of the Poseidon system with a nuclear power plant. The aft part of the project 09851 boat with a propulsion system, rudders and others, judging by the photos of the withdrawal from the boathouse, are almost identical to those of the nuclear-powered strategic missile submarines of the modified project 09552 (project 955A, code "Borey-A").
Earlier, on July 8, 2022, the Russian Navy received the first carrier of the Poseidon ocean multipurpose system, the BS-329 Belgorod special purpose nuclear submarine of project 09852 (serial number 91664), converted from an unfinished nuclear submarine of Project 949A. Since 2012, Belgorod has been completed according to project 09852 and received four 2P39 launchers for carrying and launching 2M39 underwater vehicles of the Poseidon system.
According to the previously published reports of the Central Design Bureau of MT Rubin, the Khabarovsk submarine of project 09851 was supposed to be delivered under the terms of the contract in 2020, but only now the boat has entered factory sea trials.
In 2016, it was reported about the plans of the MT Rubin Central Design Bureau to carry out a design and maintenance work on the construction of the project 09853 order at the NSR, which is presumably a modified (or serial) version of the 09851 boat, but so far there have been no reports about the start of construction of the 09853 boat.
A special base is being built in Kamchatka in Krasheninnikov Bay to base the Project 09851 and 09852 submarines and their Project 20183 support vessel.
As for the state of work on the Poseidon ocean multipurpose system, on October 29, 2025, President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin announced the first test of the Poseidon underwater vehicle with a nuclear power plant turned on. Putin said that "yesterday we conducted another test of another promising complex. This is an underwater unmanned underwater product - Poseidon, also with a nuclear power plant. For the first time, we managed not only to launch it with a launch engine from a carrier submarine, but also to launch a nuclear power plant on which this device has passed a certain amount of time."
