News RSS Feed


Living Mobile news, sport and travel from the Daily Echo Read Chief Superintendent Matthew Greening's Blog Tweet with the Daily Echo

Oasis of the Seas to visit Solent

6:10pm Friday 30th October 2009


THE biggest cruise ship in the world will be making a brief appearance in The Solent next Monday.

Never before has there been a vessel the size of Royal Caribbean International’s brand new Oasis of the Seas.

The mega-ship is so large that it is divided up into seven different “neighbourhoods’’ – including one called Central Park, open to the sky and with trees, grass lawns, and flowers all growing on deck.

Although there is no fixed time for Oasis of the Seas’ arrival, it is thought she might be in position towards late afternoon.

Up to 6,360 passengers and 2,100 crew can be accommodated over 16 decks on Oasis of the Seas, which cost $900m.

The 225,000-ton vessel, more than three times the size of Southampton’s former Queen Elizabeth 2, will be stopping in The Solent close to Lee-on-the- Solent while en route from the builders’ yard in Finland to America, where she will enter service in the Caribbean.

Oasis of the Seas is making the diversion to disembark 300 yard workers who sailed from Finland and do not need to be aboard for the Atlantic crossing.

The vessel boasts a zip-line thrill ride that races diagonally nine decks above an open air atrium plus a full-size ice rink as well as rock-climbing walls.

There will also be a traditional fairground and an aquatic amphitheatre that is a pool by day and theatre by night.

Royal Caribbean, which has a second ship on the same scale under construction, operates the previous record-breaking ship Independence of the Seas from Southampton.


More News stories

Your Say YourEcho

gorf, Southampton says...
6:22pm Fri 30 Oct 09

credit crunch?
global warming?
bug ger it

security word used-baby???

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

sotonwinch09, Winchester/Eastleigh says...
7:05pm Fri 30 Oct 09

lol@the security word

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

soton1980, Southampton/Fareham says...
8:31pm Fri 30 Oct 09

In my opinion it looks absolutely awful and like a floating block of flats. Size isn't everything and I'd pick the much, much prettier QM2 over this anyday.

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

X Old Bill, Sunny South Coast says...
9:00pm Fri 30 Oct 09

I like big ships and I enjoy cruising, but I think that they've lost the plot here.
I feel reassured when I feel a ship move underneath me but I bet you could probably play snooker on that floating island.

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

Delboy1, Chandlers Ford says...
11:08pm Fri 30 Oct 09

QM2 pretty??? Just a smaller block of ugly black flats I think!

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

ex sch worker, Southampton says...
11:50pm Fri 30 Oct 09

These days all they are just floating holliday camps. No gracious lines of a true ocean liner. Its a block of flats or an hotel on a hull

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

Sotonianman, says...
3:24am Sat 31 Oct 09

The Finnish Government had to give a loan of 40% and guarantee 95% of the construction cost to get this ship built. Credit crunched ship alright, might end up with Carnival sometime. Larger and heavier container ships call at Southampton.

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

Andy Locks Heath, says...
8:57am Sat 31 Oct 09

The Echo used to measure cruise ships using the good old imperial measurements of double decker buses and football pitches. Now we are measuring them in QE2s. It's just another example of metrication by the back door.

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

Ben Doone, Dubai says...
10:18am Sat 31 Oct 09

Interesting comments on comparative looks of the vessel.
Of course beauty is in the eye of the beholder and many would say, understandably, that the liners of yesteryear were more easy on the eye.
However who actually will actually chose a cruise ship/liner because of its looks. Very few I warrant.
Price, facilities and itinerary are the main criteria.
Cruise ships look like blocks of flats because most passengers want balconies.
Also cabin size/on board facilities arte light years away from the revered ships of yesteryear.
I think Sotonians should celebrate the fact that these ships are coming to Soton (or in this case Soton Water)

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

goard, Southampton says...
10:33am Sat 31 Oct 09

The World is building ships that can carry passengers to warm places - that is all we cooler clime humans need is warmth. IF YOU HAVE THE MONEY! but look at the tourist trade, the airlines, the smaller boat industry, it could harm them - it is really dog eat dog. The World has become a 'fast buck' trade - 'get out if you cannot keep up with us'. I can see something really ugly happening in this World - our Bankers are probably hanging over the whole scenario like vultures - investing their spoils into these BIG consortiums. It's an ugly old world - Somali Pirate skills have nothing on us - the modern world.

goard

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

Ben Doone, Dubai says...
12:05pm Sat 31 Oct 09

Goard
Nothing changes. Banks/Financial institutions have always been a catalyst of our prosperity/decline, in whatever particular time you dip into history.
Also it was the airlines that caused the decline in the liner trade in the 1950's, so this was also a case of 'dog eat dog' situation, as you call it. Nothing new. Canals v Wagons (1700's) Railway v Stagecoach.(1800's) Bus v Railway (1900's)
Parallels are there from recent history. Could describe this more aptly as 'competition'!!!

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

Captain Swing, Southampton says...
12:27pm Sat 31 Oct 09

Andy Locks Heath wrote:
The Echo used to measure cruise ships using the good old imperial measurements of double decker buses and football pitches. Now we are measuring them in QE2s. It's just another example of metrication by the back door.
The increasing size of ships will soon render the "? X QE2" obsolete.
Computer programes are already being designed to express seagoing vessels in fractons of small countries or US states. e.g. the Oasis of the Seas is half the size of Wyoming, and so on.
That said, if the Torys win the next election we will probably adopting Wales as the standard measurment of ship dimensions: flouting the EU directive to employ the Belgium.
It will be interesting to see how things develop, but if the ships get much bigger we could be in danger of Great Britain being dragged half way across the Atlantic if skippers forget to raise their anchor.

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

goard, Southampton says...
1:40pm Sat 31 Oct 09

Ben Doone - appreciate your appraisal of competition - of course you are right - sadly, there is only one victim, the public. It sure is a big boys game. Ugly ain't it?

goard

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

GHamilton, Swindon says...
2:43pm Sat 31 Oct 09

Most beautifull ocean going liner ever, was the Normandy, then QE2, then its probably the Disney liner...all these modern ships are asthetically ugly, totaly agree they just look like a block of flats.

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

southy, redbridge says...
8:25pm Sat 31 Oct 09

GHamilton wrote:
Most beautifull ocean going liner ever, was the Normandy, then QE2, then its probably the Disney liner...all these modern ships are asthetically ugly, totaly agree they just look like a block of flats.
no its got to be the old queen mary 1, then the old queen elizabeth 1, and the fastest liner ever ss untied states.

ben it was the early 70's saw the decline in passenger liners, when air flying started to become cheap. it was the first jumbo jet 747 in 1970 that saw the demize of the passenger ships.

so andy how many tennis courts is it.

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

Ben Doone, Dubai says...
4:58pm Sun 1 Nov 09

The downturn of passenegr liner traffic started in 1955. If you check the Soton and UK liner stats this will become clear to you.
In fact the number of liner passengers out of Soton in 1955 was a record 585,000 not surpassed until 3 years ago (but mainly cruise passengers then)
1955 coincided with BOAC ordering 19 Comet 4 airliners with greater speed and range which meant that business folk could reach the USA in hours rather than days . This proved to be the start of the demise of passenger liner shipping although the subsequent development of bigger and faster aircraft accentuated this decline

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

Andy Locks Heath, says...
5:27pm Sun 1 Nov 09

The QE2 ship measurement question reminds me of attempts we made to introduce new measurements into our calculations back in my youth. I always liked the microfortnight - (which actually works out at just over a second), or but anyone can create their own, for instance a micropool (where 1 pool = 1 olympic sized swimmng pool) works out at .06775 cu ft. Meanwhile from my own extensive research at the time a session was a unit of beer whose value was settled at 7 pints. Therefore 1 session = 2.08 micropools. and the same scale would be usful in this case. How many sessions would be required to float the Oasis of the Seas?
Drink up lads.

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

southy, redbridge says...
11:41am Mon 2 Nov 09

ben even lo the comet had started flying the comet 4c could only sit 99 passengers. and it was mainly business people that was using them. the regular passenger runs where still being fully book. with people who where visiting friends and family, going on holiday or immigration, whitch was the bulk of the 1955 passengers, a great number of those immigration runs was going to australia. the first regular shipping run to get hit, was the southampton to new york run, whitch felt the pinch in the 60's, with the interduction of the 707, london to new york run. but the rest of the world it was normal business, and when the 747 came along that put the nail in the coffin, it drop the price of an air ticket to australia by half. and the prices have been dropping ever since, what do you pay for a ticket now to austailia £500 to £700, ten years ago that ticket would of cost you about £1,300, in the 60's that would of cost you well over £2,700 to fly to austrailia, where has by ship it takes a lot longer, but it cost less than a £1,000. and immigration steerage ticket proberly was only about £60 to £100

Report this post »    Register/Sign In »

Comments are closed on this article.

Oasis of Seas to visit Solent Oasis of Seas to visit Solent


Video News Food & Restaurant Reviews

Local Advertisers

Local Information

Enter your postcode, town or place name

House prices »   Schools »   Crime »   Hospitals »