Samsung Built World"s Largest Oil Drillship

Samsung Heavy Industries Co., Ltd. successfully manufactured and delivered a drillship, the world's largest deep sea oil drilling ship, to the ship owner Sep 29 at its Koje shipyard. This 103,000 ton ship, ordered by a consortium made of Conoco of the Dupont Group, the U.S. and R&B (Read & Bates), an expert oil developer, at a price of 240 million dollars last 1996, is the largest among the marine oil drill ships ever built so far.
The drillship manufactured by Samsung for the first time in the nation's history is a product born of the combination of shipbuilding and plant technologies. The successful, simultaneous manufacturer of both ships and plants by a single company, breaks away from the old practice of receiving orders for and manufacturing ships and plants separately, has provided a moment to improve shipbuilding and offshore plant technologies.
Compared with the typical type of ships currently in operation, which are 20,000 to 30,000 ton ships modified by loading plants onto tankers, this drillship is higher than LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas) ships priced at approximately 220 million dollars and equal to three very large crude carriers (VLCC) in price. It is a high-value-added ship with the the largest price for a single ship ever built by domestic shipyards.
Measuring 221.5m in length, 42m in width and 20m in height, the drilling equipment can reach crude oil and natural gas to a depth deeper than the height of the Mt. Everest. Built with a double hull structure, this ship is operated by a floating system which is run by a pollution-free electric propulsion system. It is a next-generation ship designed for stable operation by using the Dynamic Positioning system to prevent rolling in inclement marine environments, such as rough waves, wind, and currents. This ship can move at a speed of 12 knots or higher even with the drilling plant loaded, and is particularly useful in deep waters or rough currents where a great deal of expenses and time is required to install marine platform, or when it is required to check for the existence of oil in a short period of time.