Amoco Cadiz oil spill Amoco Cadiz oil spill The oil tanker "Amoco Cadiz" ran aground on Portsall Rocks, from the coast of Brittany, France, on 16 March 1978, and ultimately split in three and sank, all together resulting in the largest oil spill of its kind in history to that date. NOAA estimates that the total oil spill amounted to 220,880 metric tonnes of oil. En route from the Persian Gulf to Rotterdam, Netherlands, via a scheduled stop at Lyme Bay, Great Britain, the ship encountered stormy weather with gale conditions and high seas while in the English Channel. At around 09:45, a heavy
History of the oil tanker Island in Bantry Bay. The Total tanker was still not fitted with inert gas. The "Energy Concentration" did have this system, preventing an explosion when it broke in two on 21 July 1980 during discharge at Europoort. It has also saved many lives during the Tanker War. Washing with water in combination with the Load on Top system was replaced by crude oil washing (COW), a method developed by BP. The advantages were cleaner tanks, no corrosive sea water in cargo tanks and no polluted sea water being pumped overboard. On 10 October 1973 the Yom Kippur War begun, causing