MV Prestige was an oil tanker owned by a Greek company based in Athens and operating under a Bahamian flag of convenience, that on 19 November 2002 sank off the coast of Galicia, Spain. The sinking caused a major environmental disaster, polluting thousands of miles of coastline with of oil.
Design and construction Prestige was a single-hulled oil tanker with a length overall of , a beam of , a hull depth of , and a draft of . It had a and a total cargo capacity of .
The ship was launched on 10 December 1975 and completed on 30 March 1976 by Hitachi Shipbuilding and Engineering Co. in Maizuru, Kyoto, Japan. At the time of its sinking, it was owned by Mare Shipping, and registered in the Bahamas.
See also List of oil spills Plataforma Nunca Máis Aegean Sea, another oil tanker that sank off the Galician coast in 1992
References
External links Prestige at the Ministry of the Sea (Galicia) (Xunta de Galicia) The Prestige: one year on, a continuing disaster a report by the World Wide Fund for Nature Prestige Ship Structure Case Study