History | |
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Name: |
|
Owner: | Amoco |
Operator: | Troodos Shipping |
Port of registry: | Cyprus |
Builder: | |
Launched: | 1973 |
Out of service: | 11 April 1991 |
Identification: | IMO number: 7304302 |
Fate: | Sunk at 44°13′N 8°28′E / 44.22°N 8.46°ECoordinates: 44°13′N 8°28′E / 44.22°N 8.46°E |
General characteristics | |
Tonnage: | 233,690 DWT |
Displacement: | 230,000 tonnes |
Length: | 334.02 m (1,095.9 ft) |
Beam: | 51.06 m (167.5 ft) |
Draught: | 19.80 m (65.0 ft) |
Propulsion: | Diesel, single screw |
Speed: | 15 knots (28 km/h) |
Complement: | 44 |
MT Haven, formerly Amoco Milford Haven, was a VLCC (very large crude carrier), leased to Troodos Shipping (a company run by Lucas Haji-Ioannou and his son Stelios Haji-Ioannou). In 1991, while loaded with 144,000 tonnes (1 million barrels) of crude oil, the ship exploded, caught fire and sank off the coast of Genoa, Italy, killing six Cypriot crew and flooding the Mediterranean with up to 50,000 tonnes of crude oil. It broke in two and sank after burning for three days, and for the next 12 years the Mediterranean coast of Italy and France was polluted, especially around Genoa and southern France.
Amoco Milford Haven was built by Astilleros Españoles S.A. in Cadiz, Spain, the sister ship of Amoco Cadiz, which sank in 1978. Launched in 1973, she worked various routes shipping crude oil from the middle east gulf. In 1988 she was hit by a missile in the Persian Gulf during the Iran-Iraq War. Extensively refitted in Singapore, she was sold to ship brokers who leased her to Troodos Shipping, for whom she ran from Iran's Kharg Island to the Mediterranean.
On 11 April 1991, Haven was unloading a cargo of 230,000 tonnes of crude oil to the Multedo floating platform, 11 kilometres (6.8 mi) off the coast of Genoa, Italy. Having transferred 80,000 tonnes, the ship disconnected from the platform for a routine internal transfer operation, to allow oil to be pumped from two side-holds into a central one.