Instead, they are called "very large crude carriers" and even "ultra large crude carriers."
Some of the reasons that allowed tankers to grow to so large were, of course, technological advances in engineering and ship-building material. Though these technological advances made the construction of supertankers possible, the initial impetus for constructing them largely was political. The Suez Canal in Egypt, constructed in 1869 and enlarged periodically since then, is the primary trade route for ships and supertankers traveling from the oil-rich countries around the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea and points beyond. Although a convenient alternative to sailing around the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa, the Suez Canal has, on a number of occasions, been closed due to armed conflicts. Such closures forced ships to travel the great distance around the Cape in order to get to the Mediterranean, Europe, and the Americas. However, because ship-builders no longer had to consider the Canal's dimensions, larger tankers could be built. By constructing larger tankers for the longer hauls, the additional cost and time it would take to sail around the Cape would be compensated by the fact that each tanker could carry more petroleum on each trip.
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