Was this ‚storm oil’ ever more than ‚snake oil’ ?
I never understood how an oncoming braking wave could be ‘calmed’ with oil pushed by the storm just inches off the windward side of a ship. Leeward from the ship, there could be some flattening of the waves, with enormous quantities of thick oil… but would that be helpful to the ship?
Some 50 years ago, I read experiences with oil bags on sailing boats. They tried it just once.
The deck became inundated with oil; impossible to do anything useful on the slippery deck.
When the weather forecasts for the open oceans were nearly a lottery, a bottle of olive oil overboard, unscrewed or not, could have saved the ship… without knowing, if the ship could have survived without this bottle.