Launch of M.S. Joseph R. Smallwood 11th July 1972

The Swan Hunter shipyard celebrates the launch of a tanker built to serve the Come By Chance oil refinery in Newfoundland.

The Seaburn Sea Cadets drum up a storm at the launch of the Joseph R Smallwood from Swan Hunters shipyard in Hebburn, a tanker named after the premier of Newfoundland. This was familiar territory for local production house Turners who had worked on film commissions for Swan Hunters since the 1950s. The tanker would soon be embroiled in political controversy when the Newfoundland oil refinery it was built to serve caused one of the largest Canadian bankruptcies in history.