The Scourge of the American Petroleum Tankers That Prowl the British Columbia Coast
November 26 marked a dreadful anniversary for the tanker-bedraggled British Columbia coast. One year ago in Hecate Strait, the American ATB “pusher tug” Jake Shearer broke apart from its fully loaded 10,000 deadweight-ton capacity petroleum barge and came within a stone’s throw of destroying the most magnificent, wild and precious region of the Pacific Ocean.
The Jake Shearer is a new-generation tugboat which is set up to lock into, and push its petroleum barge rather that towing it by cable in the conventional manner. The bow of the tug is fitted with two giant hydraulic locking pins, while its tanker barge is fitted with a large notch cut out of its transom. Once mated together, these two vessels then become an “articulated tug/barge unit” or “ATB.” The tug pushes into the transom notch and the locking pins extend out sideways from the bow and engage into large racks fitted within the transom of the barge. Then, mated together “doggy style” as it were, the tug/barge combo goes about its business.
A fully loaded American “ATB” tanker travelling up the BC Inside Passage. Photo: Ian McAllister
In this case, the business of the Jake Shearer was to deliver domestic petroleum products to Southeast -AKA “Panhandle” Alaska, which it did on a regular, once every 2-3 week schedule, travelling back and forth through the BC Inside Passage. Alaska’s 5 oil refineries supply about 80% of its domestic fuels needs, but the remaining 20% is delivered to the “Panhandle” via the BC coast by ATB, -with each trip carrying on average, a load of about 10,000 deadweight tons. To illustrate, that is about 1/4 of the spill volume released into the Gulf of Alaska by the Exxon Valdes.
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