The Seawise Giant was a supertanker built in Japan in 1979 and stretched after a refit. By the time it was finished, it measured 1,504 feet from bow to stern - longer than the Empire State Building is tall. Fully loaded with crude oil, it could carry over 4 million barrels and weighed an astonishing 657,000 tons.
A ship that big had problems. It was too long to fit through the Suez Canal or the Panama Canal, and the English Channel was too shallow for it when fully loaded. It needed a turning radius of about 2 miles and around 5.5 miles to slow to a stop. Captains had to start braking long before they saw a port.
The ship was bombed and sunk during the Iran-Iraq War in the late 1980s, then salvaged, repaired, and put back into service. After being renamed several times - Happy Giant, Jahre Viking, Knock Nevis - it was eventually scrapped in India in 2010. Its giant anchor is now displayed at a maritime museum in Hong Kong.
