The State : Oil Tanker Rams Pier

The 883-foot Overseas Juneau, a tanker carrying 17 million gallons of crude oil, hit a pier and demolished a 100-foot section of a concrete catwalk while trying to dock at the Chevron refinery at Richmond, narrowly missing a major crude oil pipeline. Chevron port superintendent Charlie Adam told the San Francisco Chronicle that “50 feet this way (and) it’d have been a total disaster.” The incident, which occurred three weeks after the Exxon Valdez ran aground in Alaska’s Prince William Sound, spilling nearly 11 million gallons of oil, is under investigation by the state Board of Pilot Commissioners and the Coast Guard. Maritime Overseas Corp. of New York, which operates the Overseas Juneau, declined comment.