Walter B. Parker Act, which was signed into law in 1980 by U.S. President Jimmy Carter. On March 24, 1989, the Exxon Valdez oil tanker struck Bligh Reef in Prince William Sound, spilling an estimated 260,000 to 750,000 barrels of crude oil. The Exxon Valdez oil spill was a major environmental disaster for the state. Governor Steve Cowper, who held office at the time of the spill, appointed Walter Parker as the chairman of the Alaska Oil Spill Commission in 1989. The Alaska Oil Spill Commission was created by the Alaska state government to investigate the causes of the Exxon Valdez oil spill.
History of the oil tanker of the U.S. This schooner was fitted out as an oil tanker in 1906, and sunk in a storm off Isles of Scilly in Dec. 1907. The 1880s also saw the beginnings of the Asian oil trade. The oil industry in Azerbaijan was the largest producer in the world at that time, but was limited to the Russian market. John D. Rockefellers Standard Oil dominated the world market. The idea that led to moving Russian oil to the Far East via the Suez Canal was the brainchild of two men: importer Marcus Samuel and shipowner/broker Fred Lane — the London