Suomen Joutsen begins two-million-euro overhaul
Thursday 1st October 2026 on 10:45 in
Finland
The Finnish museum ship Suomen Joutsen is undergoing a five-year, two-million-euro overhaul that includes repairs to its masts and rotting pine deck, Yle reports. The ship is due to be towed to a repair yard in Naantali on October 7.
The work began in 2024 and is scheduled to continue until 2028. Overhauls of this scale are carried out roughly every 30 years.
The ship currently has two masts partly dismantled. Repairs to the foremast are nearing completion, while the upper sections of the other two masts have been taken elsewhere for maintenance. Each mast is made up of three sections and stands about 50 metres tall.
Work is also under way inside the ship, where staff aim to repair as many of its thousands of components as possible. Only parts they cannot service themselves are sent to subcontractors. Shipmaster Perttu Mäkinen and boatswain Alexey Bogomolov are working with two other staff members.
Some of the pine deck boards also need replacing. The boards, made from carefully selected Finnish pine, were renewed during the overhaul 30 years ago, but some have since rotted because the seams between them leaked. “We have to replace quite large sections,” Mäkinen said.
At the Naantali repair yard, the ship’s sides and bottom will be sandblasted and painted. Some rust is visible below the waterline. The ship is expected to spend two weeks at the yard.
Owned by the City of Turku, Suomen Joutsen is cared for and operated as a museum by Forum Marinum, the organisation responsible for its museum activities. Forum Marinum chief executive Ulla Teräs said the ship’s reputation dates back to the 1930s, when it made training voyages around the world. She described it as a rare surviving historic vessel and a landmark in Turku.
The ship turns 125 in 2027. For the anniversary, its exhibition space inside the ship will be renewed. Suomen Joutsen is usually open to the public in summer, but visitors will not be able to board during the autumn holiday this year because of the renovation. Teräs said winter opening could be considered in future.
Built in France in 1902 as a cargo ship, Suomen Joutsen was bought by Finland in 1930 to serve as a navy training ship, with a crew of 180. It has been a museum since 1991. The ship is 96 metres long and 12.5 metres wide, and its highest recorded speed is 16.4 knots.