Worlds Largest Cruise Ship.

[Captain Kong]

It should be Anchored off Syria with its engines removed and the Invaders could stay there.
Brian

[John Gill]

#25. not so sure about that Kong. Some enterprising group of people smugglers could jury-rig a set of sails on her and fill her up with economic and terrorist migrants and head for Europe.(hopefully after June 23rd that'll be Europe's problem).

[Ivan Cloherty]

What a hideous monstrosity,
FOURO.

Design draught is 30 feet on a displacement of 225,000 tonnes, navigating bridge is approx 140 above the waterline, she has 16 decks you need about 8.25/8.5 feet for each deck taking into account beams and deckhead spaces to give an in cabin roof height of 7 feet. I prefer my ships the other way around, more under the water than above it, makes me feel safer, but I am old!

[Keith Tindell]

One day, one day, we will all be proved right, as we all know the sea has no masters. If you can imagine evacuating that many people from a hotel, where they only have to exit to fresh air and a car park etc, now put the same scenario at sea in a storm, just gives me the shivers kt

[Captain Kong]

I saw her sisters in Sydney and they are far to big and are higher than the Harbour Bridge. and that is High
Brian

[Des Taff Jenkins]

9000 passengers and crew, 18 life boats, what is the capacity of each life boat!!! must have a large number of carley floats as well to accommodate that many people. as brian said, total panic should anything go wrong. It boggles the mind.
regards, stan

Hi Stan.
How many boggled minds do you think would be on that ship if she started to go down. It would be the biggest ocean pollution on record with all the excreta that would be floating around.
Cheers Des

[j.sabourn]

Des I have been in a situation on a much smaller scale, there is no such thing as an orderly situation when people think they are going to die. Everyone reacts differently, although I was not in a position to see some of the panic some of my crew did tell me later of some of the reactions of some who found themselves after being rescued not yet out of the woods and had to stay and watch a further loss of life and destruction. They themselves must have suffered trauma but carried on. Others looked around on someone to blame for their situation, and without saying too much a couple of others tried to gain later advantage to the situation they had undergone. A passenger ship today with the amount of passengers and to me a dubious crew mostly employed not for their skills but for their suitability to keeping the payroll down doesn't make the situation any better. Going on all the courses going does not make them much better, as have to be seamen first last and foremost and able to come to grips with the job they have been stuck with. Most foreign crews I have been with, just prayed that such a situation never arose. Even during the war I would imagine carrying 9000 troops would have been considered hazardous, carrying 9000 old age pensioners a hundred times more so. Cheers JS

[Keith Tindell]

I see on the BBC news site that Carnival cruise are to issue passengers with a medallion type internet connection that willow allow passengers to purchase from the ships shops, unlock your cabin door as you approach, trace friends who are onboard, and navigate around the ship etc. Wonder if they will guide you to your lifeboat, or just cause gridlock ?. Won't be bothering me anyway, kt

[John Arton]

K.T.
The world is going mad with ever more reliance being made on electronic gadgetry. Women can even buy jeans this day that directs them to their destination, which should hopefully stop them from charging down the street with their eyes glued on their smart phone screens instead of looking at where they are going. Children today are totally reliant upon electronic gadgets to provide them with their entertainment and so are spending more and more of their time staring at screens instead of getting out into the open air and playing ball games etc.
Shipping is going along with this electronic age with watch keepers ever more reliant on electronics to navigate or monitor the engine room with the concept of crewless ships growing ever nearer.
Will it make for a safer world, whether on cruise ships or elsewhere.
No way will it. To safely carry large number of passengers (who mainly have no idea of the dangers of or the power of, the oceans or to carry the vast amounts of potentially hazardous cargoes been shipped world wide daily, you can only do that using well trained and dedicated seafarers. When you expose anything to the forces of nature no amount of electronic wizardry can keep you totally safe, though regretfully good seafarers are becoming a declining asset.
rgds
JA

[Ivan Cloherty]

Totally agree with what you say John, crewless vessels are on the way, 'Crewless instituted by the Clueless' where everything works fine on mathematical computerised projections, unfortunately mother nature in mid Atlantic or mid Pacific has never heard of computer projections and throws the occasional if not frequent wobbler, even in today's world with all its technology when projecting the path of hurricanes how often have you heard 'Hurricane xxxxx has suddenly veered north or south etc' mother nature doesn't give a damn what you have projected. Are passenger vessels going to be devoid of all crew apart from hotel type staff, no disrespect to our catering colleagues on site or currently afloat, a lifeboat certificate gained in a wet dock or alongside a vessel in port does not a seaman make, continuously being exposed to the elements, handling deck equipment and reading the sea when traversing the decks a seaman makes, skills all necessary when in a lifeboat, if you remove the deckies/navigators (that word again) you remove a major part of the safety system. Some whizz kid sitting thousands of miles away in a cocoon reading weather reports and programming a computer to the vessel and projecting what it is going to encounter does not sit well to an old fashioned seaman, but then again if you hark back to the days of the 40's/50's (not you John, you're too young!!) and see the illustrations in Dan Dare comics, they are not far off the mark of what is sailing or flying these days...............as Doris Day would trill 'the futures not ours to see'