- Title: SPAIN: HUGE TANKER FOR KUWAIT OIL COMPANY LAUNCHED DOWN SLIPWAY.
- Date: 16th November 1974
- Summary: 1. GV Shipyard 0.03 2. LV and SV Ship waiting to be launched (2 shots) 0.08 3. SV and CU Abdul-Aziz Al-Sagar watches as flags hoisted and Anthems played (3 shots) 0.29 4. SCU Al-Sagar presses button to break bottle of cold tea on ship's bow 0.30 5. LV Ship down slipway 0.42 6. CU Al-Sagar (nearest) with Minister of Finance and Oil for Kuwait 0.47 7. GV Ship into water (2 shots) 1.01 8. GV Waves sweeping onto cars on harbour 1.12 9. LV People watching 1.14 10. SV Car driving away through floodwater(2 shots) 1.22 11. SV PAN FROM swamped cars TO Al-Andalus at anchor 1.33 Initials OS/1808 OS/1821 Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
- Embargoed: 1st December 1974 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: EL FERROL DEL CAUDILLO, SPAIN,
- Country: Spain
- Reuters ID: LVAF42DKC7TW9K2O0XBF7OMR4ECQ
- Story Text: The largest tanker ever built by a Spanish shipyard was said to be the first ship of its size to be launched down a shipway anywhere in the world on thursday (14 November).
Previously, ships of this size -- mostly built in Japan -- were floated out of the dry docks rather than launched.
The unusual launching -- with a bottle of non-alcoholic cold tea instead of the traditional champagne -- however, almost turned into a dampening start when the tanker sent a big tidal wave ashore and swamped spectators' cars parked on the wharf.
The ship -- of more than 360,000 tons -- was built for the Gulf Oil Company of Kuwait -- hence the Moslem ban on champagne. It was the seventh to be built in Spain for the company and its affiliated companies.
The vessel, the Al-Andalus, pushed Gulf Oil's total fleet tonnage to over 1.3 million tons. Its fleet now includes ten tankers capable of shipping 12 million tons of oil annually from Kuwait to Europe or America and about 21 million tons from Kuwait to Japan.
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