Giant 'super skimmer' no help with Gulf oil spill

HOUSTON, July 16 (Reuters) - A Taiwanese-owned "super skimmer" ship sent to help clean up the Gulf of Mexico oil spill has collected virtually no oil in two weeks of tests, a U.S. Coast Guard official said on Friday.

"All we found in the tanks was water, so it was very ineffective," Coast Guard Rear Admiral Paul Zunkunft, federal on-scene coordinator, told a news briefing.

The 1,100-foot (335-metre) "A Whale," an ore and oil carrier refitted for skimming, was sent by TMT Shipping Offshore to help clean up oil spewing since April 20 from BP Plc's (BP.L: Quote) (BP.N: Quote) blown-out Macondo well.

The vessel arrived the first week of July in search of a contract with BP and began undergoing tests, which were hampered at first by bad weather. Conditions have since improved, and the tests have continued.

"The results are the amount of oil recovered by the A Whale is nil," Zunkunft said.

TMT billed the ship, which skims oil through horizontal slits on its sides, as a vessel that could collect up to 500,000 barrels (21 million gallons) of contaminated water per day.

Zunkunft said part of the challenge for the A Whale was maneuvering a large vessel to pick up scattered patches of oil, many no larger than a kitchen table. It also was not equipped with suction but let oily water in the slits as it sailed.

"The A Whale will probably need further modifications, and it may need a different type of oil spill, where you have thick, heavy oil that is concentrated in order to be effective," Zunkunft said. (Reporting by Bruce Nichols and Kristen Hays; editing by Mohammad Zargham)