How The Biggest Ships Were Built

The Batillus class supertankers are the largest vessels by gross tonnage ever built. There were 4 of them, each at 555,000 metric tons DWT, constructed by France in the 1970s. A gross tonnage of Batillus is 275,276 tons. Still, if considering fully-loaded displacement, the Batillus ships don’t hold the world’s record. They are edged out by the Seawise Giant ship that serves as an oil tanker. Still, the Batillus class ships are records for tankers (with the depth of 36 meters and full load draft of 28.5 meters)