cargo tanks. Each tank is fitted with a deep well cargo pump.
The 658-foot-long ship is also fitted with a cylindrical appendage-type bulbous bow to improve speed, and is powered by a GE steam turbine engine. The Blue Ridge and her sister ships incorporate state-of-the-art equipment and meet the latest safety and environmental protection standards including double bottoms, a clean segregated ballast system, an inert gas system, a sewage treatment plant, collision avoidance radar, and a backup steering system.
The ships, ordered by Union Oil in April 1979, were built entirely without federal subsidy. The shipbuilder is a wholly owned subsidiary of Morrison-Knudsen Company, Inc., Boise, Idaho.
The Blue Ridge hull was constructed in the flat-bottomed, 1,000-foot-long NASSCO building dock. Launching was accomplished by flooding the dock and floating out the vessel.
The name Blue Ridge is in honor of the mountain range in the Appalachians extending from New England to Georgia. The second of the sisterships, Coast Range, was launched on January 10, 1981, and the third, Sierra Madre, was launched on May 2. The Blue Ridge will transport products from Union Oil's refinery in Beaumont, Texas, to Atlantic and Gulf Coast ports.
S/S BLUE RIDGE
Main Propulsion ... General Electric turbines and gears, 13,000-shp, 1,500-kw ship service turbogenerators Propellers ... Ferguson Shaft ... Waukesha Bearings ... Waukesha Panels ... General Regulator Steering ... Sperry Marine Boilers ... Foster Wheeler Condensers ... Transamerica DeLaval Pumps ... Worthington (27) Deepwell cargo Radar ... Raytheon Navigation ... ITT Mackay Winches and Davits ... Lake Shore Anchor/chain ... Hewett Marine Fairleads ... Appleton Marine