History of the North Sea the North Sea though they saw little action. The Austro-Prussian War (1866) resulted in Prussia's gaining full control of the Kiel Canal, allowing their Baltic ports access to the North Sea. France declared war on Prussia 19 July 1870 which initiated the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871). The French Navy was, at the time far larger and superior to the North German Federal Navy, the Navy of the North German Confederation. Though the French did take a number of merchant ships bound to and from North Germany, shortages of manpower and coal, as well as conflicting orders, made the attempted blockade of
White Sea–Baltic Canal had plans to carry 800,000 tonnes of fuel oil over the canal during 2003, and to increase the volume to in 2004. The fuel was transferred from Volgotanker river tankers to Latvian seagoing tankers at a floating transfer station near the Osinki Island in the Onega Bay of the White Sea, north-east of the port of Onega. Transfer operations began on 24 June 2003. But on 1 September 2003 a low-speed collision between Volgotanker's "Nefterudovoz-57M" and the Latvian "Zoja-I" during a transfer caused a crack in the "Nefterudovoz's" hull, with a subsequent oil spillage. Various estimates of the extent of