SS San Flaviano SS " San Flaviano " was a 1950s British oil tanker owned by Eagle Oil and Shipping Company , a British subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell . She was built by Cammell Laird in England in 1956 and attacked and sunk by the CIA in Borneo in 1958 . " San Flaviano " had a sister ship , , built by Cammell Laird in the same year . The two ships were part of a substantial investment programme to renew Eagle Oil ' s fleet with larger and more modern tankers . Between 1950 and 1960 the company took delivery of at least 16 new tankers . Bombed and sunk by the CIA . " San Flaviano " s career was cut short in 1958 . On 28 April " San Flaviano " was in Balikpapan Harbour , in the East Kalimantan Province of Borneo , when a Douglas B - 26 Invader bomber aircraft , flown by the CIA and painted black and with no markings , bombed and sank her . " San Flaviano " had nearly finished discharging a cargo of crude oil , leaving her tanks full of highly flammable gas . The CIA aircraft hit " San Flaviano " with one or more bombs amidships on her starboard side . Fire and explosions spread rapidly along that side of the ship , either destroying her starboard lifeboats or making them inaccessible . Nevertheless her officers and crew launched both port lifeboats within four minutes , successfully evacuating everyone including a passenger , the Chief Officer ' s wife . " San Flaviano " sank near the entrance of Balikpapan harbour . In response , Royal Dutch Shell suspended its tanker service to Balikpapan and evacuated shore - based wives and families to Singapore . Most of " San Flaviano " s complement were also evacuated to Singapore , travelling on two oil tankers of Anglo - Saxon Petroleum , another of Royal Dutch Shell ' s British subsidiaries . The first 26 from " San Flaviano " left that same day on , which had had a narrow escape in the same air raid . Another 24 from " San Flaviano " followed a few days later on , leaving the Master ( Captain Jack Bright ) and his senior officers as the only people from " San Flaviano " still in Balikpapan . In June 1958 both the Indonesian and UK governments claimed that the aircraft had been flown by Indonesian rebels . In fact only the radio operator was from the Permesta rebels in North Sulawesi . The B - 26 , its bombs and its pilot , former USAAF officer William H Beale , Jr were sent by the CIA as part of US covert support for the rebellion . The CIA pilots had orders to target commercial shipping in order to drive foreign merchant ships away from Indonesian waters , thereby weakening the Indonesian economy and destabilising the Indonesian government of President Sukarno . Shell ' s suspension of operations and partial evacuation of personnel was exactly what the CIA attack was intended to achieve . For some months previously , UK Prime Minister Harold Macmillan and Foreign Secretary Selwyn Lloyd had supported US policy to aid Permesta . On 6 May 1958 , more than a week after the CIA sank " San Flaviano " , Lloyd secretly told US Secretary of State John Foster Dulles that this was still his position . On 18 May , Indonesian forces shot down a different Permesta B - 26 and captured it its CIA pilot , Allen Pope . Nevertheless , in June 1958 both Indonesia and the UK publicly claimed that the aircraft had been flown by Indonesian rebels , concealing the CIA involvement of which both governments were well aware .