MV Bridgeton, ex-al-Rekkah, was a Kuwait Oil Company oil tanker

Oil tanker

An oil tanker, also known as a petroleum tanker, is a merchant ship designed for the bulk transport of oil. There are two basic types of oil tankers: the crude tanker and the product tanker. Crude tankers move large quantities of unrefined crude oil from its point of extraction to refineries...

 that was reflagged during Operation Earnest Will

Operation Earnest Will

Operation Earnest Will was the U.S. military protection of Kuwaiti owned tankers from Iranian attacks in 1987 and 1988, three years into the Tanker War phase of the Iran–Iraq War. It was the largest naval convoy operation since World War II.The U.S. Navy warships that escorted the tankers, part of...

. Bridgeton was built by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries

, or MHI, is a Japanese company. It is one of the core companies of Mitsubishi Group.-History:In 1870 Yataro Iwasaki, the founder of Mitsubishi took a lease of Government-owned Nagasaki Shipyard. He named it Nagasaki Shipyard & Machinery Works, and started the shipbuilding business on a full scale...

, Nagasaki and was launched August 14, 1976. The tanker was built as al-Rekkah, renamed Bridgeton and scrapped as Pacific Blue. Bridgeton struck an Iranian mine near Farsi Island

Farsi Island

Farsi Island is one of the Iranian islands in the Persian Gulf. There is an IRGC Navy base on this Island. The island is completely restricted to public, due to top secret governmental activities....

 during the first Operation Earnest Will escort mission on July 24, 1987. Operation Prime Chance

Operation Prime Chance

Operation Prime Chance was a United States Special Operations Command operation intended to protect U.S.-flagged oil tankers from Iranian attack during the Iran–Iraq War. The operation took place roughly at the same time as Operation Earnest Will , the largely Navy effort to escort the tankers...

 was conducted as a response to this mining. In September 1987, Iran Ajr

Iran Ajr

Iran Ajr, formerly known as the Arya Rakhsh, was a Japanese-built landing craft used by Iran to lay naval mines during the Iran–Iraq War. Built in 1978, the 614-ton, 54-meter ship was powered by two diesel engines and featured a bow ramp for unloading cargo...

 was discovered laying mines, was captured and scuttled by US forces.

Fate

Some of the reflagged tankers returned to Kuwaiti flags in January 1989, but Bridgeton and several others remained US flagged. Bridgeton transferred to Panamanian registry and was renamed Pacific Blue in the late 1990s. The supertanker was scrapped in 2002 at Haryana Ship Demolition in Alang, India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

.