Poignant moment as shipping tycoon’s daughter names gas carrier after him
I WRITE this week from Busan in South Korea. Past this modern and vibrant city moves a daily armada of ships – at the time of writing a couple of dozen are passing to or from Japanese, Chinese or other Korean ports, not to mention the queue of vessels awaiting berths at Busan.
Among these are small coastal tankers, carrying refined products to umpteen ports in the region; others are large container ships on long-haul voyages or smaller feeder vessels linking lesser ports with the giant shipping hubs in Korea, Japan and China.
Early on Monday – a cold morning – I boarded a bus for the twohour journey to the Daewoo Shipyard in Geoje, to the west of Busan, for the naming ceremony of the gas carrier Torben Spirit, the newest unit in the fleet of vessels operated by Teekay LNG.
Towards the end of the programme, Yumi Karlshoej, the 23-year-old daughter of the late tanker owner, Torben Karlshoej, took to the podium.
“I name this ship Torben Spirit,” she announced in a clear, strong voice. The champagne bottle crashed against the side of the 294m gas carrier, the crowd cheered, and the ship’s foghorn boomed over the shipyard.
The Teekay Corporation, of which Teekay LNG is part, owes its origin to the foresight and hard work of a former Danish farm boy, Torben Karlshoej who emigrated to the US as a teenager.
After several disappointments, he finally struck the right formula from which emerged a successful tanker operation, based initially in Long Beach, California and later in Vancouver, Canada.
Two disasters hit Karlshoej’s growing company. The first was a financial challenge when the prices of tankers he had ordered from a Japanese shipyard increased in yen terms, and he faced possible bankruptcy. However, he knew that once the new tankers were in service, he would be able to repay the banks who had lent him the money to build the vessels. His impeccable record with his bankers saved the day and repayments on the debts were rescheduled.
Only months later, one of his tankers, Nagasaki Spirit, collided with an erratically-steering container ship in the Straits of Malacca. A massive fireball engulfed both, killing all but two of Nagasaki Spirit’s crew.
As a shipowner who knew and cared about his crews, the loss of life staggered Karlshoej, and obviously added immensely to his high stress levels.
When his daughter Yumi named the gas carrier in his honour this week, it was a special, poignant moment for she had never met her father. When her mother Aiko told her husband Torben the exciting news that she was expecting Yumi, he was delighted.
Tragically, he died suddenly later that night.
The news of his passing spread rapidly through global shipping circles and many believed that Teekay would be sold off following his death. “This will be like a fire salvage sale,” wrote a contemporary shipping reporter.
His foresighted brother, Axel, and a small group of friends thought otherwise. “Teekay is not for sale,” Axel responded adamantly, “and it’s business as usual.”
Teekay’s subsequent phenomenal growth propelled it to become one of the leading operators in the tanker, offshore and gas sectors. Like all shipping companies, Teekay has weathered the decade-long downturn in the oil industry, but, amid a more positive forecast for the gas sector, the state-of-the-art Torben Spirit will go on charter early next month.
An aside to this story is pertinent. In 1993, Aiko Karlshoej launched the Aframax tanker Torben Spirit (1), with Yumi, then a few months old, at her side.