The Beiyou 572 class

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 cru ...

is a class of naval

auxiliary ship An auxiliary ship is a naval ship designed to support combatant ships and other naval operations. Auxiliary ships are not primary combatant vessels, though they may have some limited combat capacity, usually for purposes of self-defense. Auxil ...

currently in service with the People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN). The name of this class is after the first unit commissioned, with the exact type still remains unknown, and a total of four of this class have been confirmed in active service as of mid-2010s. Beiyou 572 class series ships in PLAN service are designated by a combination of two Chinese characters followed by three-digit number. The second Chinese character is You (油), meaning oil in Chinese, because these ships are classified as

s. The first Chinese character denotes which fleet the ship is service with, with East (Dong, 东) for

East Sea Fleet The Eastern Theater Command Navy (), or East Sea Fleet (ESF; ), is one of the three fleets of the People's Liberation Army Navy, operating in the East China Sea under the Eastern Theater Command. It was the first naval force formed by the Peop ...

, North (Bei, 北) for North Sea Fleet, and South (Nan, 南) for

South Sea Fleet The Southern Theater Command Navy (), or the South Sea Fleet (SSF; ) is one of the three fleets of the Chinese People's Liberation Army Navy, operating in the South China Sea under the Southern Theater Command. It is headquartered in Zhanjiang, ...

. However, the pennant numbers may have changed due to the change of Chinese naval ships naming convention.

References

{{Ship classes of the Chinese Navy, state=uncollapsed Auxiliary ships of the People's Liberation Army Navy