RUSSIAN PETROL.

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 708, 8 March 1933, Page 7

RUSSIAN PETROL.

Tanker Brings Cargo from Batoum. (Special to the “ Star.”) AUCKLAND, March 8. With the arrival of the British motor tanker Oil Reliance at Auckland this week came the first cargo to be brought direct from Russia to New Zealand for many years. The ship was loaded with petrol "at Batoum, on the Black Sea. Batoum. where the Oil Reliance loaded, is in Georgia, and the amount of motor spirit exported from the port can be gauged from the fact that once when the master of the Oil Reliance, Captain G. B. Whiting, was there no fewer than twenty-six ships were waiting to load. On her present trip the tanker brought 7179 tons of benzine, for discharge at Auckland, Wellington, Lyttelton and Dunedin.

The cargo represents the first shipment of Russian spirit to be brought to the Dominion, and was purchased by the Associated Motorists’ Petrol Company. The vessel left Batoum on January 20 and experienced an uneventful voyage. The chief engineer of the vessel mentioned with some show of pride that the ship had come the 12,000 miles from Suez to Auckland without a stop, a highly creditable performance for a motor ship. Prior to her present charter the Oil Reliance, which is owned by the British Oil Shipping Company," was laid up for twelve-months at Rotterdam.

To mark the arrival of the first cargo of Russian petrol, a dinner was given at the Grand Hotel by the importing companj - .