It’s been almost 25 years since humans thought it would be a brilliant idea to attempt to move one of the largest offshore natural gas platforms.

When it comes to shipping there have been some interesting things shipped over the years. The most commonly shipped items are food, clothing, furniture, and electronics. However the largest object moved by ocean is Troll A. 

Troll A is the world’s tallest movable man made construction.

This natural gas platform sits on the Troll gas field, located 174 miles (280 km) off the western coast of Norway. Rather than construct this massive structure in place in the middle of the ocean, engineers decided it would be much easier to build it on land and then move it into the proper location. This ultimately resulted in 10 tugboats pulling the structure over water on this 174-mile journey.

The trek itself was a televised sensation in 1996 when it was towed into the North Sea.

The entire project cost roughly $650M and took 5 years to complete. Norwegian Contractors worked as the main developer on the project for Norske Shell, the managing oil company at the time. It’s now run by Statoil. Upon completion in 1996, the tower set the Guinness World Record for the largest offshore gas platform.