Largest Ship and Largest Super Tanker

Knock Nevis, or T.T. Jahre Viking is the biggest ship ever built. It is a class ULCC (Ultra Large Crude Carrier) class super tanker, she is 485 meters long (1503 feet), she can stand taller than the Petronas Twin Towers of Malaysia. When loaded, Jahre Viking sits up to 25 meters deep. Due to this enormous size, Jahre Viking cannot pass the Panama Canal or the Suez Canal, nor can she enter the English channel.

She has a cargo capacity (deadweight tonnage) of 564,763 tons, Jahre Viking can carry about 650,000 m³ (4.1 million barrels) of crude oil in a single shipment. Jahre Viking initially built with a displacement of 480,000 tons. It was built in Japan at Sumitomo Heavy Industries Yard at Opera in 1975 as hull number 1016. It was then known as the Seawise Giant.

She was later sold to C. Y. Tung who took it back to the ship builder Nippon Kokan to have it extended, after which she measured 458.5 meters, this added another 87,000 tonnes deadweight, to make her, at 564,763 tonnes, the largest ship ever. During the Iran-Iraq war, T.T. Jahre Viking was hit by the Iraqis on 14 May 1988 while transiting the Hormuz Straits. After the wa ended, she was sold to a Norwegian company. They refloaded the ship and brought it to the Keppel shipyard in Singapore. After major repairs, in October 1991, she was sailing again, under her new name “Happy Giant”.

Later she was sold to Jorden Jahre for the sum of $39 Million. It was at this stage that the ship was renamed Jahre Viking.