Ship clamps shut on the butt of a cosmic joke

It's hard to believe no one objected, but it's for real.

My boss received an email yesterday with this photo attached, and you'd be forgiven for thinking it was an April Fool's Day joke.

But no, Titan Uranus is a real oil tanker with a gross tonnage of 137,746 and is registered as HK-1325 with the Marine Department in Hong Kong.

It belongs to the rapidly expanding and listed Titan Petrochemicals Group, which likes to name its fleet after stars and planets.

Perhaps the intriguing name serves as a reminder for its operators of the danger of leakage.