Sun Ship Tanker Christening Highlights Yard's Family Day

A 120,000-deadweight-ton tanker was christened at Sun Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Co., Chester, Pa., on June 3, 1978, by Mrs. Roger Bexon before an audience of several thousand shipyard workers and their families. Mrs. Bexon, the wife of a senior SOHIO official, christened the 869-foot tanker, the Kenai.

The vessel is named after a region along the southern coast of Alaska, and is the second "ecology" class tanker to be built by Sun Ship for time charter to SPC Shipping, Inc., a subsidiary of The Standard Oil Company.

The tanker will carry crude oil from Valdez, Alaska to Pacific Coast ports. The tanker is scheduled for delivery later this year.

Immediately preceding the christening, Sun Ship president Peter S. Hepp welcomed the audience of shipyard workers and their family and friends to the yard.

The christening was a highlight of a Sun Ship Family Day program that included an open house of the yard shops and shipbuilding facilities, shipyard displays, an employee arts and crafts show, and musical entertainment by the Chester City Band and the Duffy String Band.

The Kenai is a Sun-designed double-hull "ecology" class tanker incorporating several environmental safeguards. The ship's doublehull space combined with other ballast spaces in the ends of the ship provide the tanker with a clean ballast capacity of 43,000 tons.

High-strength steel has been used in the upper deck plating and sheer strake areas to enhance structural crack resistance in cold weather service. A sewage storage and treatment system is provided on the ship. Oilwater separators clean the bilge water and cargo tank washings before discharge overboard.

Other features of the Kenai include automation, permitting control of engine speed and direction from the bridge, air-conditioned crew quarters, and an elevator connecting the four superstructure decks with the engine room. Four pumps are installed to discharge the 845,000-barrel cargo in 12 hours.

Maritime Reporter Magazine, page 32, Jul 15, 1978

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Maritime Reporter

First published in 1881 Maritime Reporter is the world's largest audited circulation publication serving the global maritime industry.