6:10pm Friday 30th October 2009
By Keith Hamilton
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.
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