Germany's Ernst Jacob has placed another of its LR1 tankers into the hands of growing UK pool operator Navig8.
The 74,000-dwt Nordic Tristan (built 2007) joined the LR8 operation this month, Navig8 said.
Four other Jacob ships are already in the LR8 pool, all built in 2011 and 2012.
The German owner operates nine tankers, including a suezmax.
The LR8 pool now numbers 15 ships.
"We are pleased to welcome Jacob’s latest addition to our growing LR8 pool," Navig8 said.
Pools expanding
In September, the Navig8 group said it had added the 75,000-dwt LR1 tanker Red Eagle (built 2011) to the LR8 pool.
The owner is Adhart Shipping of Singapore, a new partner for Navig8.
Last month, Navig8 signed up its first ship from Roswell Tankers of Athens: the 115,000-dwt aframax Seliger (built 2009).
The deal lifted the aframax pool to nine ships, built between 2006 and 2018.
Navig8 has been busy adding suezmaxes rather than aframaxes in recent months, however, mainly forging new ties to Greek owners.
The company said Avin International's 152,000-dwt Kriti Breeze (built 2003) joined in November.
Greek owners Transmed Shipping and AllSeas Marine added two vessels in October.
These agreements followed a first pools agreement earlier that month with Spanish shipowner Ibaizabal Tankers.
In June, Navig8 confirmed it was taking over seven vessels controlled by Trafigura through a combination of pool membership and time charters. The ships were a VLCC, three suezmaxes, an aframax and two LR2s.
This deal was Navig8's biggest addition since the capture of eight Ridgebury Tankers suezmaxes last year.
