Posted on 01/27/2024 11:10:36 AM PST by dynachrome
The Royal Caribbean-owned Icon of the Seas will begin its first official cruise later Saturday, sailing away from Miami and toward the Caribbean.
The world’s largest cruise liner’s first official trip, which will go seven nights, comes about two months after builder Turku Meyer transferred ownership over to Royal Caribbean and just a couple weeks after the ship first reached its home port in southern Florida.
The Icon of the Seas owes its title of world’s largest cruise liner to its nearly 1,200-foot length and its nearly 248,700 gross tons. It also has 20 decks, all but two of which are open to guests.
"When you drive up even to the port, you can’t help but just go ‘wow,’" Ingraham told FOX Business about the size of the ship. "And as we were sitting there waiting to take off, there were a couple other cruise ships that would come by – and these are massive cruise ships – but they look small next to the Icon of the Seas."
(Excerpt) Read more at foxbusiness.com ...
Interesting:
“Icon of the Seas will be the first cruise ship for Royal Caribbean to be powered by LNG-fuel, meaning it relies on liquified natural gas.”
https://cruise.blog/2023/01/icon-of-the-seas-cruise-guide
More:
“As for technical specifics, the boat is equipped with 17 lifeboats with the capacity for up to 450 people — meaning it has room for 7,650 people, despite its capacity for 7,960.”
World’s largest cruise ship labeled ‘monstrosity’ ahead of maiden voyage
https://nypost.com/2023/07/13/icon-of-the-seas-labeled-a-monstrosity-ahead-of-first-sail/
“The International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) stipulates that a ship must have enough lifeboats to accommodate 75% of the people on board.”
https://cruiseshiptraveller.com/cruise-ship-lifeboats/
Who’s familiar with the “150 rule” (now superseded)?
There ‘was’ the 370-person CRV55 lifeboat
https://gcaptain.com/schat-harding-worlds-largest/
Now there’s the MPC 49 (450 capacity, believed to be lifeboat for the IOTS)
https://www.nauticexpo.com/prod/palfinger-marine-gmbh/product-31453-511008.html
Growing up around the Great Lakes, we were always told that the 1200-foot-long ore boats on these lakes were the longest vessels on earth, and that they were limited to this only because the longest lock on the river between Lake Superior and Lake Huron was that length. The reason they were the longest was that ships that long could break apart because ocean waves were close enough together that a wave crest could pick up the bow of the ship on one end, and another crest could pick up the stern. The ship would then crack in half. I wonder how the Icon of the Seas is going to deal with that. I suppose owners could argue that present storm forecasting will keep the ship away from storms that create these crests. They should maybe watch the videos of the "Rogue Waves" that roughed up the Marshall Islands a couple of days ago.
That's why they have an abundance of brownies on the last day.
RE: Cruise Ship “Black Water”/sewage...it is dealt with in multiple ways by the different cruise line companies...treated onboard and the dried “biomass” offloaded in port (what the “Icon of the Seas” does)...some ships pump the sewage off onto a sewage barge in port...and sometimes it is dumped at sea more than 3/12 miles offshore...all are options:
https://www.worldcruiseindustryreview.com/features/featurewhat-a-waste-9973923/
https://www.marineinsight.com/tech/blackwater-treatment-onboard-cruise-ships-explained/
I consider myself smarter than PEOPLE that have no idea what they are talking about.
Just the opposite. The ships use maceraters to grind up and discharge food waste with grey water. Sharks and fish follow the cruise ships.
So, it’s a manners, thing. I still see upsides and downsides with this forum. It’s not private chatting. I try not to just interrupt the talking of others with one-word insults. I look at the post a person is replying to, to try and make sense of the situation. I suppose you can argue that “Ignorant” is not an insult, but most people would think it is, even when used in a sentence.
As far as the cruise-ship thing goes, I don’t know what to believe. One guy says the sewage is treated, and a diver says he sees it clearly underwater. Probably, they’re both right. The sewage can, and must be treated and stored near a port, where heavy shipping would otherwise destroy the waters. At sea, the sewage has to go, and the less spent, the better. When the ship carries 8000 people, it becomes a lot of sewage. That is what I was responding to.
I consider that all people don’t know what they’re talking about, from time to time.
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