The TI class of
supertankers
An oil tanker, also known as a petroleum tanker, is a ship designed for the bulk transport of oil or its products. There are two basic types of oil tankers: crude tankers and product tankers. Crude tankers move large quantities of unrefined crud ...
comprises the ships ''TI Africa'', ''TI Asia'', ''TI Europe'' and ''TI Oceania'' (all names as of July 2004), where the "TI" refers to the
VLCC
An oil tanker, also known as a petroleum tanker, is a ship designed for the bulk transport of oil or its products. There are two basic types of oil tankers: crude tankers and product tankers. Crude tankers move large quantities of unrefined crud ...
tanker pool operator Tankers International. The class were the first
ULCCs (ultra-large crude carriers) to be built in 25 years.
By
displacement
Displacement may refer to:
Physical sciences
Mathematics and Physics
*Displacement (geometry), is the difference between the final and initial position of a point trajectory (for instance, the center of mass of a moving object). The actual path ...
,
deadweight tonnage
Deadweight tonnage (also known as deadweight; abbreviated to DWT, D.W.T., d.w.t., or dwt) or tons deadweight (DWT) is a measure of how much weight a ship can carry. It is the sum of the weights of cargo, fuel, fresh water, ballast water, provi ...
(≈ cargo mass), and
gross tonnage
Gross tonnage (GT, G.T. or gt) is a nonlinear measure of a ship's overall internal volume. Gross tonnage is different from gross register tonnage. Neither gross tonnage nor gross register tonnage should be confused with measures of mass or weigh ...
(a formula value based on internal volume, not mass), the TI class ships are smaller only than
Pioneering Spirit
''Pioneering Spirit'' (formerly ''Pieter Schelte'') is a catamaran crane vessel owned by the Switzerland-based Allseas Group designed for the single-lift installation and removal of large oil and gas platforms and the installation of record-w ...
.
Compared to the TI class, the
Maersk Triple E class
The Triple E class is a family of very large container ships with a capacity of more than 18,000 TEUs, which are owned and operated by Maersk Line.
With a length of , when they were built they were the largest container ships in the world, but ...
container ship
A container ship (also called boxship or spelled containership) is a cargo ship that carries all of its load in truck-size intermodal containers, in a technique called containerization. Container ships are a common means of commercial intermodal ...
s are
longer
"Longer" is a song written and recorded by the American singer-songwriter Dan Fogelberg and released in 1979 by Full Moon Records and Epic Records. The song can be found on Fogelberg's 1979 album ''Phoenix''. It was also included on his 1982 grea ...
and have a higher cargo volume, including above-deck containers.
The previous largest ship, the supertanker ''
Seawise Giant
TT ''Seawise Giant''—earlier ''Oppama''; later ''Happy Giant'', ''Jahre Viking'', ''Knock Nevis'', and ''Mont''—was a ULCC supertanker that was the longest self-propelled ship in history, built in 1974–1979 by Sumitomo Heavy Industries i ...
'', was dismantled in 2010.
History
All four
oil tanker
An oil tanker, also known as a petroleum tanker, is a ship designed for the bulk transport of oil or its products. There are two basic types of oil tankers: crude tankers and product tankers. Crude tankers move large quantities of unrefined crud ...
s were constructed for shipping company Hellespont Group by
Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering
Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co., Ltd ( ko, 대우조선해양; abbreviated DSME) is one of the "Big Three" shipbuilders of South Korea, along with Hyundai and Samsung.
History
On 21 February 2011, the A. P. Moller-Maersk Group (Ma ...
in
Okpo,
South Korea
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...
, entering service between March 2002 and April 2003. The ships were originally named ''Hellespont Alhambra'', ''Hellespont Fairfax'', ''Hellespont Metropolis'' and ''Hellespont Tara''.
In 2004, Belgian shipowner
Euronav
Euronav is a Belgian international shipping enterprise which focuses on oil transport by sea. Euronav is considered to be one of the major independent global oil shipping firms.
Euronav is in the process of merging with another leading oil tanker ...
NV and partners purchased all four ships. ''Hellespont Fairfax'', ''Hellespont Tara'', ''Hellespont Alhambra'' and ''Hellespont Metropolis'' were renamed ''TI Oceania'', ''TI Europe'', ''TI Asia'' and ''TI Africa'' respectively.
''Hellespont Fairfax'' was the subject of
The Discovery Channel
Discovery Channel (known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery) is an American cable channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav. , Discovery Channe ...
's
television show
A television show – or simply TV show – is any content produced for viewing on a television set which can be broadcast via over-the-air, satellite, or cable, excluding breaking news, advertisements, or trailers that are typically placed betw ...
''Superships'', episode "Launching a Leviathan—''Hellespont Fairfax''.
''Hellespont Metropolis'' cost $89 million in 2002, requiring 700,000 man-hours of direct labor.
Features
The class, each ship powered by a single
HSD-
Sulzer 9RTA84T-D delivering at 76 rpm, possesses a relatively high service speed ( laden, in ballast), which increases their earning capacity. The steel
scantling
Scantling is a measurement of prescribed size, dimensions, or cross sectional areas.
Shipping
In shipbuilding, the scantling refers to the collective dimensions of the framing (apart from the keel) to which planks or plates are attached to form th ...
s are greater than the class minimum.
These ships are wider than the
new Panama Canal locks. They also cannot travel through the
Suez Canal
The Suez Canal ( arz, قَنَاةُ ٱلسُّوَيْسِ, ') is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea through the Isthmus of Suez and dividing Africa and Asia. The long canal is a popular ...
unless on a ballast voyage.
The coatings in the ballast tanks are protected by two features, a full-time double-scrubbing system supplying drier
inert gas
An inert gas is a gas that does not readily undergo chemical reactions with other chemical substances and therefore does not readily form chemical compounds. The noble gases often do not react with many substances and were historically referred to ...
to the ballast tanks, and also by the white painted upper hull reflecting the sun’s energy. The inert gas system also increases safety. Keeping down the cargo temperatures also minimizes
hydrocarbon
In organic chemistry, a hydrocarbon is an organic compound consisting entirely of hydrogen and carbon. Hydrocarbons are examples of group 14 hydrides. Hydrocarbons are generally colourless and hydrophobic, and their odors are usually weak or ex ...
emissions.
Conversion
In 2009 and 2010, ''TI Asia'' and ''TI Africa'' were converted into sophisticated
floating storage and offloading
A floating production storage and offloading (FPSO) unit is a floating vessel used by the offshore oil and gas industry for the production and processing of hydrocarbons, and for the storage of oil. An FPSO vessel is designed to receive h ...
(FSO) vessels,
moored
A mooring is any permanent structure to which a vessel may be secured. Examples include quays, wharfs, jetties, piers, anchor buoys, and mooring buoys. A ship is secured to a mooring to forestall free movement of the ship on the water. An ''an ...
off the coast of
Qatar
Qatar (, ; ar, قطر, Qaṭar ; local vernacular pronunciation: ), officially the State of Qatar,) is a country in Western Asia. It occupies the Qatar Peninsula on the northeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in the Middle East; it sh ...
in the
Persian Gulf
The Persian Gulf ( fa, خلیج فارس, translit=xalij-e fârs, lit=Gulf of Persis, Fars, ), sometimes called the ( ar, اَلْخَلِيْجُ ٱلْعَرَبِيُّ, Al-Khalīj al-ˁArabī), is a Mediterranean sea (oceanography), me ...
at the
Al Shaheen Oil Field
The Al Shaheen Oil Field is a production oil and gas field off the north east coast of Qatar in the Persian Gulf, north of Doha. The oil field lies above the North Gas Field, one of the largest gas fields in the world. The field has been opera ...
. The extensive conversions were carried out by EuroNav and Overseas Shipholding Group at Drydocks World – Dubai.
In 2017, ''TI Europe'' was chartered by
Statoil
Equinor ASA (formerly Statoil and StatoilHydro) is a Norwegian state owned enterprise, state-owned multinational energy company headquartered in Stavanger. It is primarily a petroleum company, petroleum company, operating in 36 countries with ad ...
and converted to an FSO vessel, moored at
Port of Kuala Sungai Linggi
The Port of Kuala Sungai Linggi, or Sungai Linggi commercially known as Linggi International Floating Transshipment & Trading HUB (LIFT-HUB), is a transshipment area for liquid bulk transshipments and break-bulking from western regions such as the ...
in
Malaysia
Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...
.
In 2019, it was announced that ''TI Oceania'' would be converted to an FSO vessel and moored off the coast of
Singapore
Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...
.
Information obtained from
IMO GISIS Ship and Company Particulars,
MarineTraffic
MarineTraffic is a maritime analytics provider, which provides real-time information on the movements of ships and the current location of ships in harbors and ports. A database of information on the vessels includes for example details of the lo ...
, Euronav and branches, and Subsidiaries of International Seaways
15 February 2020.
See also
*
List of world's longest ships
The world's longest ships are listed according to their overall length (LOA), which is the maximum length of the vessel measured between the extreme points in fore and aft. In addition, the ships' deadweight tonnage (DWT) and/or gross tonnage ( ...
* ''
Seawise Giant
TT ''Seawise Giant''—earlier ''Oppama''; later ''Happy Giant'', ''Jahre Viking'', ''Knock Nevis'', and ''Mont''—was a ULCC supertanker that was the longest self-propelled ship in history, built in 1974–1979 by Sumitomo Heavy Industries i ...
''
*
''Batillus''-class supertankers
References
External links
Euronav vesselsSeaways Fleet listshipspotting.com Categorized ship photos
''Hellespont'' homepage
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ti Class Supertankers
Oil tankers
Ships built by Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering