shipload

• They took away giant tortoises by the shipload--tortoises stacked on their backs in the hold of a ship can live as much as a year without food or water--providing the crew with fresh meat It may have seemed insignificant to the pirates, but in leaving behind their livestock, they set in motion a chain of events that would eventually lead to an important discovery in European social science. —  Omni: September 1994
• It had been growing ever since, a shipload or more of stone a year, with every king trying to leave his mark on it. —  Carr, John F, Kalvan Kingmaker (v1.0) (html).html
• If a test shell exploded against an uncharted rock like a shipload of tritonite, then the rock needed marking with a seetee blinker. —  ASTOUNDING
• This whole thing of Harold Keeper, the way it seemed to bear no relation to Waldo Loring's murder, or Glacia's disappearance, or a shipload of uranium ore, was unnerving. —  173 - Once Over Lightly
• The Snakes were buying supplies by the shipload, and the crews of all those freighters were crowding watering holes like this one to and past capacity. —  AnalogSFF,June2006

Used in the Same Context