The Russian exercise started with corvette "Stoikiy" and tank landing ship (LST) "Korolyov" being deployed to the North Sea in early March. In mid and late March, the three remaining corvettes saw deployments as well. "Boikiy" was active in the southern North Sea, together with LSTs "Minsk" and "Kaliningrad", while "Steregushchiy" and "Soobrazitelnyy" were active in the central North Sea. Present auxiliary ships included tug "Nikolay Chiker", tankers "Kola" and "Akademik Pashin", as well as special-purpose ship "Yantar". Adding the "Yaroslav Mudry's" deployment to the Indian Ocean, this means that all active major surface combatants of the Baltic Fleet were active at the same time, which was an unprecedented event at the time and can be roughly compared only with the "Ocean Shield 2019" exercise, where two LSTs, three corvettes and a frigate were active in the Baltic Sea. At the same time, however, frigates "Admiral Grigorovich", "Admiral Essen" and "Admiral Makarov" of the Black Sea Fleet were also active. On 26 March, the combined Russian force with two Black Sea Fleet frigates, three corvettes and two LSTs of the Baltic Fleet was tracked by a 9-ship strong Royal Navy squadron.