Bob,

I don't know why you would believe that. I am not saying that I think
that they are not a good feature.

As a follower of such things, I have noted that in some of the losses by
grounding, the double hull will possibly prevent a tank from breaching
and maybe allow a savage crew time to unload the ship before it breaks
up. Please take not of the conditional phrases.

In the reference article, there is no mention of plating damage (they
don't say water came into the voids), so there is no certainty that the
double hull was any factor here.

Since there have been three recent losses where ships broke up at sea,
there is no reason to expect that the situation will inprove any where
but Prince William Sound.

The real failure of the Exxon Valdez event was the failure of the oil
shipper to fulfill their promise to stage spill control equipment in
fast striking distance to the oil port. It is there now.

The double hull tankers may have a shorter life due to the higher
maintenance requirement. This means they will end up in the hands of
less capable shipping companies sooner than the others.

What I am waiting to see the impact of is the Double-Double tankers.
These are double hull tankers with twin power plants and even including
twin sterring engines - complete redundency. No single device failure
can leave the ship without manuerving capability.

Matt Colie - Licensed Marine and ex-tankerman

Bob Crantz wrote:

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsar...KER.xml&rpc=22

I thought double hulls would end all spills.