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Whiddy Island Disaster
The Whiddy Island disaster, also known as the ''Betelgeuse'' incident or ''Betelgeuse'' disaster, occurred on 8 January 1979, around 1:00 am, when the oil tanker ''Betelgeuse'' exploded in Bantry Bay, at the offshore jetty for the oil terminal at Whiddy Island, Ireland. The explosion was attributed to the failure of the ship's structure during an operation to discharge its cargo of oil. The tanker was owned by Total S.A., and the oil terminal was owned by Gulf Oil. The explosion and resulting fire claimed the lives of 50 people (42 French nationals, seven Irish nationals, and one British national). Only 27 bodies were recovered. A further fatality occurred during the salvage operation with the loss of a Dutch diver. Background During the 1960s, developments in the pattern of oil transportation indicated that it would soon become most economical to move oil between the Middle East and Europe using ultra large crude carrier (ULCC) vessels. These vessels were so large tha ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Time In The Republic Of Ireland
Republic of Ireland, Ireland uses Irish Standard Time (IST, UTC+01:00; ) in the summer months and Greenwich Mean Time (UTC+00:00; ) in the winter period. Roughly two-thirds of the Republic is located west of the 7.5°W meridian. Thus the local mean time in most of Ireland is closer to UTC-01:00 time than to GMT. The Standard Time Act 1968 legally established that "the time for general purposes in the State (to be known as standard time) shall be one hour in advance of Greenwich mean time throughout the year". This act was amended by the Standard Time (Amendment) Act 1971, which legally established Greenwich Mean Time as a winter time period. Ireland therefore operates one hour behind its statutory standard time during the winter period, and reverts to standard time in the summer months. This definition contrasts with the practice of other states in the European Union, which operate one hour ahead of their standard time during the summer period, but produces the same result. Th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Suez Canal
The Suez Canal (; , ') is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, Indo-Mediterranean, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea through the Isthmus of Suez and dividing Africa and Asia (and by extension, the Sinai Peninsula from the rest of Egypt). The canal is a key trade route between Europe and Asia. In 1858, French diplomat Ferdinand de Lesseps formed the Suez Canal Company, Compagnie de Suez for the express purpose of building the canal. Construction of the canal lasted from 1859 to 1869. The canal officially opened on 17 November 1869. It offers vessels a direct route between the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlantic, North Atlantic and northern Indian Ocean, Indian oceans via the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea, avoiding the South Atlantic and southern Indian oceans and reducing the journey distance from the Arabian Sea to London by approximately , to 10 days at or 8 days at . The canal extends from the northern terminus of Port Said to the southern terminus of Port ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bringin' Home The Oil
Bringin' Home the Oil is an Irish maritime folk song written in 1969 by Tommy Makem and the Clancy Brothers as the theme for a two-minute-long television commercial for Gulf Oil, as part of their sponsorship of NBC News coverage of the US space program and the national political conventions in celebration of Gulf Oil's then-new operations in Bantry Bay. The upbeat 6/8 melody is that of a traditional Scottish song, " The Gallant Forty Twa" which was also recorded by the Clancys. It tells the story of Gulf's 300,000 dwt ''Universe Ireland'', as well as mention of three other ships in the fleet: ''Universe Kuwait'', ''Universe Japan'', and ''Universe Portugal''. The song alludes to the construction of still more vessels; these would later be the vessels rounding out the six-vessel Universe-class fleet, namely the ''Universe Iran'' and ''Universe Korea''. Instrumentation in the song is simple, consisting of strummed banjo and guitar, as well as a solo tin whistle between verses. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clancy Brothers
The Clancy Brothers were an influential Irish folk music group that developed initially as a part of the American folk music revival. Most popular during the 1960s, they were famed for their Aran jumpers and are widely credited with popularising Irish traditional music in the United States and revitalising it in Ireland. This contributed to an Irish folk boom with groups like the Dubliners and the Wolfe Tones. The Clancy Brothers – Paddy, Tom and Liam – are known best for their work with Tommy Makem, recording almost two dozen albums together as The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem. Makem left in 1969, the first of many changes in the group's membership. The most notable subsequent member to join was the fourth Clancy brother, Bobby. The group continued in various formations until Paddy Clancy's death in 1998. The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem significantly influenced the young Bob Dylan and other artists, including Christy Moore and Paul Brady. The group was fa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bantry
Bantry () is a town in the civil parish of Kilmocomoge in the barony of Bantry on the southwest coast of County Cork, Ireland. It lies in West Cork at the head of Bantry Bay, a deep-water gulf extending for to the west. The Beara Peninsula is to the northwest, with Sheep's Head peninsula to the southwest. The focus of the town is a large square, formed partly by infilling of the shallow inner harbour. In former times, this accommodated regular cattle fairs; after modernising as an urban plaza, it now features a weekly market and occasional public functions. Two piers protect the harbour. Bantry is in the Dáil constituency of Cork South-West. History As with other areas on Ireland's southwest coast, Bantry also claims an ancient connection to the sixth-century saint Breandán (Naomh Bréanainn) the Navigator. In Irish lore, Saint Breandán was the first person to discover America. To the west of the town is the graveyard marking the site of a 15th-century Franciscan f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Batillus-class Supertankers
The ''Batillus''-class supertankers were a class of Tanker (ship), supertanker ships built in France in the late 1970s, with four ships of this class built between 1976 and 1979. Three of the ships were Ship breaking, scrapped after less than ten years of oil transport service each, with the fourth one scrapped in 2003. All four tankers were built in the ''Bassin C'' dock of the Chantiers de l'Atlantique shipyards at Saint Nazaire, France. History Vessels in class * , built in 1976, scrapped in 1986. * , built in 1976, scrapped in 1986. * , built in 1977, scrapped in 1983. * , built in 1979, renamed ''Sea Brilliance'', renamed ''Hellas Fos'', renamed ''Sea Giant'', scrapped in 2003. Measurements While being the largest ships ever built by gross tonnage until , the four ''Batillus''-class ships were the second largest ever constructed when measuring deadweight tonnage or length overall, behind only the supertanker (renamed five times, including to ''Knock Nevis''), whi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Berth (moorings)
A berth is a designated location in a port or harbour used for mooring vessels when they are not at sea. Berths provide a vertical front which allows safe and secure mooring that can then facilitate the unloading or loading of cargo or people from vessels. Locations in a port Berth is the term used in ports and harbors for a designated location where a vessel may be moored, usually for the purposes of loading and unloading. Berths are designated by the management of a facility (e.g., port authority, harbor master). Vessels are assigned to berths by these authorities. Most berths are alongside a quay or a jetty (large ports) or a floating dock (small harbors and marinas). Berths are either general or specific to the types of vessel that use them. The size of the berths varies from for a small boat in a marina to over for the largest tankers. The rule of thumb is that the length of a berth should be roughly 10% longer than the longest vessel to be moored at the berth. B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tonne
The tonne ( or ; symbol: t) is a unit of mass equal to 1,000 kilograms. It is a non-SI unit accepted for use with SI. It is also referred to as a metric ton in the United States to distinguish it from the non-metric units of the short ton ( United States customary units) and the long ton ( British imperial units). It is equivalent to approximately 2,204.6 pounds, 1.102 short tons, and 0.984 long tons. The official SI unit is the megagram (Mg), a less common way to express the same amount. Symbol and abbreviations The BIPM symbol for the tonne is t, adopted at the same time as the unit in 1879.Table 6 . BIPM. Retrieved on 2011-07-10. Its use is also official for the metric ton in the United States, having been adopted by the United States |
Diesel Oil
Diesel fuel, also called diesel oil, heavy oil (historically) or simply diesel, is any liquid fuel specifically designed for use in a diesel engine, a type of internal combustion engine in which fuel ignition takes place without a spark as a result of compression of the inlet air and then injection of fuel. Therefore, diesel fuel needs good compression ignition characteristics. The most common type of diesel fuel is a specific fractional distillate of petroleum fuel oil, but alternatives that are not derived from petroleum, such as biodiesel, biomass to liquid (BTL) or gas to liquid (GTL) diesel are increasingly being developed and adopted. To distinguish these types, petroleum-derived diesel is sometimes called petrodiesel in some academic circles. Diesel is a high-volume product of oil refineries. In many countries, diesel fuel is standardized. For example, in the European Union, the standard for diesel fuel is EN 590. Ultra-low-sulfur diesel (ULSD) is a diesel fuel with ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bunker Fuel Oil
Fuel oil is any of various fractions obtained from the distillation of petroleum (crude oil). Such oils include distillates (the lighter fractions) and residues (the heavier fractions). Fuel oils include heavy fuel oil (bunker fuel), marine fuel oil (MFO), furnace oil (FO), gas oil (gasoil), heating oils (such as home heating oil), diesel fuel, and others. The term ''fuel oil'' generally includes any liquid fuel that is burned in a furnace or boiler to generate heat (heating oils), or used in an engine to generate power (as motor fuels). However, it does not usually include other liquid oils, such as those with a flash point of approximately , or oils burned in cotton- or wool-wick burners. In a stricter sense, ''fuel oil'' refers only to the heaviest commercial fuels that crude oil can yield, that is, those fuels heavier than gasoline (petrol) and naphtha. Fuel oil consists of long-chain hydrocarbons, particularly alkanes, cycloalkanes, and aromatics. Small molecules, such a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ballast
Ballast is dense material used as a weight to provide stability to a vehicle or structure. Ballast, other than cargo, may be placed in a vehicle, often a ship or the gondola of a balloon or airship, to provide stability. A compartment within a boat, ship, submarine, or other floating structure that holds water is called a ballast tank. Water should be moved in and out from the ballast tank to balance the ship. In a vessel that travels on the water, the ballast will be kept below the water level, to counteract the effects of weight above the water level. The ballast may be redistributed in the vessel or disposed of altogether to change its effects on the movement of the vessel. History The basic concept behind the ballast tank can be seen in many forms of aquatic life, such as the blowfish or members of the argonaut group of octopus. The concept has been invented and reinvented many times by humans to serve a variety of purposes. In the fifteenth and sixteenth century, the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ireland's Own
''Ireland's Own'' is a general interest magazine published weekly in Ireland. Launched on 26 November 1902 by John M. Walshe of People Newspapers with an original cover price of 1d, it specialises in light-reading content, traditional stories, and uncontroversial family content, including puzzles and recipes. Original aim The magazine was designed to offer "wholesome Irish Catholic fare" to challenge the appearance of British newspapers in Ireland like the ''News of the World'' (which were denounced as "scandal-sheets" that lowered the moral tone of late 19th century/early 20th century Ireland). The magazine's appearance coincided with a broad stressing of Irish identity as a reaction to British imports. Among the other examples were the creation of the Gaelic Athletic Association to promote Gaelic games and to halt the growth of soccer and rugby (1880s), the appearance of the Gaelic League to promote the Irish language (1893), and the growth in the ''Irish-Ireland'' movemen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
