Australian Billionaire Plans To Build Titanic II 289
SchrodingerZ writes "Just in time to miss the 100-year anniversary of the fatal voyage of the Titanic, Australian mining billionaire Clive Palmer announced he has plans to recreate the Titanic, calling it Titanic II. 'It will be every bit as luxurious as the original Titanic but of course it will have state-of-the-art 21st Century technology and the latest navigation and safety systems,' says Palmer. He stated it was to be as close to the original as possible, with some modern adjustments. Its maiden voyage is set for 2016."
Go Ballmer! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Go Ballmer! (Score:5, Funny)
Sounds a little bit like a Renaissance fair, but obviously set in the early 1900s. I could see it being a nice theme cruise. Extra points if they design it to break in half and sink.
Re:Go Ballmer! (Score:5, Funny)
Lowering the bar a bit this time, then.
Re:Go Ballmer! (Score:5, Funny)
'Of course it will sink if you put a hole in it,'
How long will it last with an Italian captain?
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I'd fly on a replica Hindenburg in a heartbeat. Especially if it could be filled with helium, as it was originally designed for. But hell, I'd take my chances with hydrogen and a smoking lounge for the thrill of it.
(The US controlled the world's supply of helium, and they were worried about military uses of Zeppelins, so they wouldn't sell any to Germany at the time.)
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ATTENTION NON-AUSTRALIANS (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Go Ballmer! (Score:5, Funny)
I hope they also have dress codes for women so they will wear vintage dresses.
Yes, this is an interesting issue. As I recall the titanic was originally designed for Extreme separation of the classes, it would almost be physically impossible for steerage class and first class to ever see each other. However, the modern trend is for uniclass, with at most a slight variation in rooms which you never spend any time in anyway, as I saw on my honeymoon cruise some years ago.
I predict much heartache, because every walmart shopping, tramp stamp wearing, pork rind munching bubbette is gonna expect she will be in first class, so she's either gonna be disappointed when she spends her cruise in steerage with, perhaps at most, a guided tour of the 1st class digs, or, she's going to be all wound up about having to pack 13 pairs of shoes because clearly the grand dining room is not going to accept thongs and flipflops in its dress code. Or she tolerates all the packing and getting dressed up and goes to the fancy dinner hoping for movie re-enactment scenes where everyone dressed up as much as herself, only to find it overrun by hoodies.
As for the guys, all we want in a cruise ship is bikini suntanning area on the main deck and clothing optional tanning on the upper deck, which unfortunately does not fit the original plans as far as I know. So this will be boring.
My cruise experience showed a bimodal distribution of ages, where about 1/3 where 20-something honeymooners like my wife and myself, and 2/3 were extreme senior citizens. I can see how they needed to wait 100 years for todays oldest cruiser who was just a kid during the original Titanic sinking to have died off.
Re:Go Ballmer! (Score:5, Funny)
Yep, sounds like cruise ship passengers. The industry term is 'newly wed or nearly dead'.
Re:Go Ballmer! (Score:5, Funny)
Holy crap. The entirety of Southwest Florida is a cruise ship!
It all makes so much sense, now...
Re:Go Ballmer! (Score:5, Informative)
Another interesting economic question, "is the scale of Titanic" correct for the modern era?
Titanic:
Length: 882 ft 6 in
Beam: 92 ft
Costa Concordia:
Length: 952 ft 1 in
Beam: 116 ft 6 in
Queen Mary 2:
Length: 1,132 ft
Beam: 147.5 ft
As far as "upscale" goes the QM2, is probably near the top today. Even an affordable cruise is typically a bigger ship, Concordia class, than Titanic. While a Concordia is not much bigger, if you going to book some time on fancy floating palace don't you want to be on the very biggest? Was that not part of the Titanic's initial draw?
Re:Go Ballmer! (Score:4, Insightful)
Length isn't everything.
RMS Titanic was only 46,328 gross tons (true displacement 52,310 tons). That's less than one-third the size of the QM2 (148,528 gross tons).
Titanic is a fairly small ship by today's standards. "Average" in the current market would be 60,000 to 110,000 gross tons. Ships in the 50,000 ton class are being retired or sold off at 15 years old because they aren't profitable enough compared to the big things. (Celebrity's "Horizon" and "Zenith", for example.)
(Posting AC since still at work...)
Re:Go Ballmer! (Score:5, Interesting)
Ships in the 50,000 ton class are being retired or sold off at 15 years old because they aren't profitable enough compared to the big things. (Celebrity's "Horizon" and "Zenith", for example.)
(Posting AC since still at work...)
Depends on the market... it would suck trying to run a mid-sized ship in the hot markets (Caribbean/Mexican, Alaskan, Mediterranean, etc). On the other hand, it would hold up pretty good in the lesser-traveled markets, and given the iconic design and historical cache', the North Atlantic and possibly North Sea or North American Seaboard (New England, Canada, etc) runs would serve it pretty well.
Size or Style (Score:3, Insightful)
While a Concordia is not much bigger, if you going to book some time on fancy floating palace don't you want to be on the very biggest?
Not necessarily. Some of the fancier cruises (read - no water slides) are on smaller ships. And this should make it even simpler to reconstruct a Titanis-ish looking ship:
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Some of the fancier cruises (read - no water slides)
The water slide is the most fun a Slashdotter can have on a cruise ship.
Re:Go Ballmer! (Score:4, Informative)
Dunno - given the niche appeal, and the fact that not too many folks are going to really go for a cruise on the North Atlantic otherwise, it's actually not a bad size. Bigger would mean it would likely lack rooms. Smaller would mean that you couldn't pack all the modern amenities (shops, casino, et al) into it.
That last part is a bit important - the original ship was built only to get people from one side of the ocean to the other. Nowadays, cruises are more for pleasure, where back then they were merely for transportation. Adding the things that make a cruise modern (and profitable!) such as shops and casinos are going to eat space (the original already had a gym, a spa, and a few other goodies, including the first oceangoing swimming pool).
Re:Go Ballmer! (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, you could put the nude tanning section on the roof of the First-Class Lounge. [wikimedia.org], which IIRC was accessible to First Class passengers at the time. Just a thought.
OTOH, if you have ever sailed the North Atlantic, at any time of year, you'd know that no sane human being would want to wear a bikini, given the consistent high winds and relatively low temperatures (there's a reason icebergs were hanging around in that region in April, after all...)
Re:Go Ballmer! (Score:5, Funny)
with at most a slight variation in rooms which you never spend any time in anyway, as I saw on my honeymoon cruise some years ago.
So you barely spent time in your room on your honeymoon? Either you're doing it wrong...or you are very creative...
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New Zealand is a giant iceberg? Cripes, first that thing week with the Javanese being our enemy in WW2 and now this!
I really need to get out more.
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Global warming man. No icebergs to crash into, so we have to make do with land masses these days :-P
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Does this guy say... (Score:3, Funny)
I'M KING OF THE WORLD!?!
Re:Does this guy say... (Score:5, Funny)
I'M KING OF THE WORLD!?!
Only when his wife lets him.
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Well, that sounds unsinkable (Score:5, Funny)
but of course it will have state-of-the-art 21st Century technology and the latest navigation and safety systems
No way to sink that, then.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
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I don't think anyone who had anything to do with the design or build of the Titanic said it was unsinkable - that was the press.
It should be noted the sister ship RMS Olympic survived until 1935 - 24 years at sea. RMS Britannic was sunk in 1916 by a German mine.
Re:Well, that sounds unsinkable (Score:5, Informative)
In fairness to the engineers of the original Titanic (and her sister ships), the "unsinkable" nature of the ship was mainly in regards to ordinary leaks and minor structural failures that may happen from time to time. A lousy pilot might damage a part of the hull, but the ship was designed to withstand that kind of general damage. There were very efficient bilge pumps and the various sections of the ship were designed to keep water out.... something that did allow the ship to stay afloat for nearly an hour after it hit the iceberg.
That there were shortcomings in the design is true as well, and something that came from the accident investigation review board that was convened after the original RMS Titanic sank. Still, it was a generally sound design that was used for the original Titanic and as noted the general design did prove to be rather successful as long as general precautions were taken. The Titanic investigation review board also set the pattern for subsequent engineering failures in the future, including the loss of both American Space Shuttles (Columbia and Challenger) as well as the failure of the Tacoma Narrows "Galloping Gertie" Bridge, and for that matter almost every major airline crash investigation. These engineering/transportation investigations usually lead to new regulations, but they also help advance the state of technology in terms of knowing what not to do... something that is sadly learned from experience more often that common sense would make you hope.
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As long as they accept they face the same dangers of any other cruise ship, I assume it will have similar or better success.
Similar or better than the Titanic I shouldn't be hard to do.
Or did you mean that cruise ship lying on its side that I saw out of the window of the plane I flew to Italy on recently?
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I believe the design *was* flawed, or at least there was an issue with the materials of construction, in regard to the rivets used to hold the plates together that made up the hull.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/15/science/15titanic.html?pagewanted=all [nytimes.com]
and there's this which is totally a design thing:
Although the compartments were called watertight, they were actually only watertight horizontally; their tops were open and the walls extended only a few feet above the waterline [Hill, 1996]. If the transverse bulkheads (the walls of the watertight compartments that are positioned across the width of the ship) had been a few feet taller, the water would have been better contained within the damaged compartments.
http://www.writing.eng.vt.edu/uer/bassett.html [vt.edu]
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There may be an argument that the design was flawed in its maneuvering capacity to avoid, say, icebergs, given the visibility conditions that could reasonably be expected to occur on the route for which it was designed, and that, but for that design flaw, the design flaws impacting post-collision safety might not have been dramatically desmonstrated.
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Well, from what I understand is that it's manuvering capability was sufficient, the problem was a mirage like affect created by atmospheric distortion on the water, making objects appear above the horizon and far away, making the iceberg literally invisible on the silhouette of the night.
I think the bigger problem was the captain's decision to run flat out, at night, in an attempt to surprise the press by arriving ahead of schedule. Had he taken reasonable precautions and slowed down a little there would have been more time to react.
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Re:Well, that sounds unsinkable (Score:5, Insightful)
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Just don't get an Italian captain.
Probably strike a coral reef and sink (Score:5, Funny)
Yeah, that would be hilarious. Oh, wait, the Italians beat him to it.
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No, what's hilarious is that a filthy rich guy plans on building a ship that was created during an economic downturn, filling it full of people, and then going on a long trip where... after it hits an iceberg, all the poor people will be locked below and the ship will sink, which is not in any way a parallel to today's economy where we are bailing out billionaires 'too big to fail', and setting people up for a lifetime of loan repayment and wage slavery.
Next to 'Irony' in the dictionary will be a picture o
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Oh, settle down.
Dude just wants to build a friggin boat.
Already Sank (Score:4, Informative)
There is already a movie (using the term loosely) about the Titanic II from 2010. Spoiler Alert: Both the ship and the movie sank.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1640571/ [imdb.com]
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Kylie Minogue didn't use the name "Titanic II", but her Doctor Who episode [wikipedia.org] features a luxury liner named the "Titanic" that is on a collision course with the earth, and will wipe out all life on the planet.
"Titanic II" may have flopped because it was too silly. But, "Voyage of the Damned" had 13+ million viewers. Clearly the secret was making it even more silly, adding Kylie Minogue, and marketing it to the British.
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Shane Van Dyke is starting to grow on me. Not sure if it's cancerous...
So, he's building a steampunk ship? (Score:4, Funny)
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... and yet he wants it to be as close to the original as possible, which means using a lot of designs which are no longer used for a reason...
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Do you not understand what "as close to the original as possible" means? Clearly that means they are aware there are parts of the original design that would not be possible to reproduce. Any parts of the original design which are no longer allowed for whatever reason would among them.
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Do you not understand what "as close to the original as possible" means? Clearly that means they are aware there are parts of the original design that would not be possible to reproduce. Any parts of the original design which are no longer allowed for whatever reason would among them.
Yeah, I'm guessing "as close to the original as possible" means it will have four raked funnels and be painted black about 4-6 stories above the waterline; should be close enough to fool most cruise-goers.
Re:So, he's building a steampunk ship? (Score:4, Interesting)
I think he means aesthetically...
Give it the same general shape and layout. Keep the iconic grand ballroom. Give it fake smokestacks.
But under water, give it a bulbous hull. Bow thrusters. Weld the thing together. Naturally, give it a proper rudder :)
Inside the ship, use the huge space freed up by the change in propulsion technology and the lack of demand for "steerage" to do more traditional cruise-ship things. Cabins should look old, but be brought up to modern standards... perhaps keep a few historically accurate for people who want such things.
They will probably want to make it a little bigger - the Titanic was big for it's day, but much smaller (about 1/3 the size in tonnage) of the Queen Mary 2. Mainly, it was too narrow - under 100 feet at it's widest. Queen Mary 2 is almost 150 feet wide. I think they could fatten it without giving up too much aesthetically. More room for lifeboats :)
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Even the original Titanic had a fake smokestack. A modern ship would only need a single funnel. It simply wouldn't make sense to route the exhaust through 4 funnels when a single one would suffice - especially since even the original ship had a decorative funnel.
Re:So, he's building a steampunk ship? (Score:4, Funny)
But don't you know that each extra smokestack gives you 1k additional horsepower!?
I plan to build Iceberg II (Score:5, Funny)
It'll be pretty much like the original, but with state-of-the-art 21st Century technology like pykrete to survive in more temperate waters, and the latest targeting and weapons systems.
AC for obvious reasons, MUAHAHAHAHAAAAAA!!
Ugh. (Score:2)
Way to keep it classy, guy.
More lifeboats. (Score:5, Interesting)
Just a suggestion, but this time try having lifeboat space for every passenger, not every other passenger?
As history teaches us, the reason the Titanic sinking was a disaster, and not just a misfortune [wsj.com] was that it had enough lifeboats for the government regulations of the day, which is to say, one person-space in a lifeboat for every two passengers.
Re:More lifeboats. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:More lifeboats. (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree. Let the free market decide. If a company builds a ship with only enough life boats for half the people then the half of the people that die won't use that company again thereby correcting the problem.
Re:More lifeboats. (Score:5, Insightful)
Suppose your liner sank in the middle of the Atlantic in 1880 and everyone got in the life boats.
Then what?
You had no radio to contact any other ships, so you're just floating around in the water with very limited supplies and little chance of rescue. Unless you were lucky and some other ship saw you sink or saw any flares you were able to launch, the odds were that you would die a slow death waiting for help.
The Titanic was probably the first such sinking where there would have been a good chance of everyone surviving if they carried enough life boats. And people learned from that.
Re:More lifeboats. (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually, the atlantic shipping lanes were quite busy (even in the 1880s), which may have been part of the problem. They saw lifeboats as ferries from one ship to another, which was expected to arrive in short order.
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Unless you were lucky and some other ship saw you sink or saw any flares you were able to launch, the odds were that you would die a slow death waiting for help.
Of course, in the case of the Titanic sinking, there was a ship, the Californian, that saw flares launched from the Titanic and from her lifeboats, and in fact the Californian tried to signal the Titanic using Morse lamps. The Titanic wasn't in the middle of nowhere, it was basically in the standard ship route from the UK to the US. So yes, it would have made a big difference to have enough lifeboats for everybody.
What killed many of the passengers was sheer human stupidity (in addition to the aforementione
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640 lifeboat seats should be enough for anyone.
There were enough lifeboats for first class. If the riff raff hadn't got on the lifeboats there would ave been plenty of room for the ' important' passengers.
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Just a suggestion, but this time try having lifeboat space for every passenger, not every other passenger?
As history teaches us, the reason the Titanic sinking was a disaster, and not just a misfortune [wsj.com] was that it had enough lifeboats for the government regulations of the day, which is to say, one person-space in a lifeboat for every two passengers.
Just build Titanic III at the same time, and have it cruise alongside empty.
If Titanic II starts sinking, leave the buffet, grab your luggage, stroll across the walkway to Titanic III, find your cabin (you'll keep the same cabin number) and Bob's your uncle.
Do you suppose the steerage class wasn't meant... (Score:3)
...to use the lifeboats?
Given the classism of the era, you almost expect them to have enough spots for the passengers above a certain level but basically exclude the steerage and other lower classes from rescue.
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The only thing is that there were plenty of first class men who gave up their spot. Yes, losses were heavier in the steerage class.
For all of the classism of the era, there was also a "women and children first" ethic.
too soon for a Natalie Wood joke? (Score:3)
Do you suppose the steerage class wasn't meant to use the lifeboats?
Given the classism of the era, you almost expect them to have enough spots for the passengers above a certain level but basically exclude the steerage and other lower classes from rescue.
The only thing is that there were plenty of first class men who gave up their spot. Yes, losses were heavier in the steerage class.
For all of the classism of the era, there was also a "women and children first" ethic.
As opposed to our era with its "I fell off the ship" ethic.
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They were, but lifeboats were seen as ferries from on ship to another. The atlantic shipping lanes were busy enough that it seemed very unlikely that a sinking ship would be too far from other ships for this to be an option.
I'd rather swim (Score:2)
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I would never, in my wildest dreams, get on that boat.
Really? I would love to go for a ride if I could afford it (which I cannot). Sounds like it could be fun and interesting, and might meet some other history buffs too.
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Exactly how superstitious are you?
I think he's expecting the floating fail whale rather than having it sink underneath him. The "authentic dress up" crowd is going to be at the throats of the "just wanna wear my hoodie" crowd. The modern cruisers are going to be pissed off that its amenities are ancient. The traditionalists are going to be pissed off that it doesn't have genuine coal fueled steam engines and has too many lifeboats.
I would not be scared of being on board, but I sure as hell wouldn't want to be surrounded by pissed off peo
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Have wear my hoodie crowd stay in the 3rd class. Problem solved!
Re:I'd rather swim (Score:5, Funny)
Exactly how superstitious are you?
I would estimate about thirteen times the national average, which is unfortunate.
The Ship That God Could Not Sink (Score:2)
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I was thinking the same thing just a half second before I read your post.
Max Capricorn Cruises.. (Score:5, Funny)
What I heard... (Score:4, Funny)
I heard he's consulting with Abercrombie & Fitch on aesthetics and design. As I understand it, the hull will be pre-distressed and cost twice what a typical cruise ship costs.
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You jest, but it the hull is going to anything like the original shape, I suspect it will cost more than double that of a modern cruise ship. Modern ships are built in a modular manner, with many square bits with flat decks that are welded together. The Titanic was built old-styley, with continuously curved sides and decks. That's gonna cost some shamoolah.
Built in government-owned shipyard in China (Score:4, Interesting)
He's having it built by a government-owned shipyard in China. One that has never built a passenger ship. Jinling builds large single-engine tankers, container ships, and RORO (roll-on, roll-off) vessels. Five shipyards in Finland, France, Italy, Germany, and South Korea build most of the passenger ships in the world, and Jinling isn't one of them.
Re:Built in government-owned shipyard in China (Score:4, Funny)
He's having it built by a government-owned shipyard in China. One that has never built a passenger ship. Jinling builds large single-engine tankers, container ships, and RORO (roll-on, roll-off) vessels. Five shipyards in Finland, France, Italy, Germany, and South Korea build most of the passenger ships in the world, and Jinling isn't one of them.
This might not be as far fetched a decision as it first sounds.
Having experience with large Container ships and RORO's is perfect engineering practice for the dealing with the unique, shall we say, attributes, of the average American passenger.
boarding will be hilarious (Score:2)
This ship may very well haunt itself (Score:3)
There are some things so engrained in the human consciousness as bad or cursed and should not be brought up again, aside from reverence.
Making a Liner called the Titanic 2 or Dirigible called the Hindenburg Zwei only stand to bring forth such horrific notions and blatantly invite self-fulfilling prophecy.
Sure, feel free to spit and damn "superstition" all you want, there is something to be said about the imaginings of a mass consciousness that can actually have an effect, if only on a purely psychosomatic level -- but that's all it takes to sink a ship all over again.
How timely! (Score:2)
It's the Titanicker [nonadventures.com]!
Bankruptcy dead ahead! (Score:2)
Anyone notice the irony? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Anyone notice the irony? (Score:5, Interesting)
This is also the fourth such stunt he's pulled so far this year (bought himself the title of "national living treasure", announced a huge new Casino in the middle of nowhere which isn't going to happen and accused the local Green party of being run by the CIA). He's a clown that has weaseled his way around the rules and laws that other people have to abide by and really has done little more than make a huge number of lawyers (he sues a lot) and himself rich.
To sum up - Don King on a bad day is far less ridiculous.
Sir, it's an emergency! (Score:5, Funny)
Why Not Build Something New And Useful Instead? (Score:2)
Why not invest the money in Tesla, bullet trains, solar/wind generated electricity, vaccines for 3rd world children, developing a compressed air battery car further, etc?
The world doesn't need a working replica of an obsolete ship.
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Because billionaires have no idea how the real world works.
It will be every bit as luxurious as the original (Score:2)
He is saying "It will be every bit as luxurious as the original Titanic" and also "as similar as possible to the original Titanic in design and specifications".
But the Titanic design wouldn't be anything near luxurious in 2012. For starts not cabins except for the best first class cabins had bathrooms. Adding them to cabins would require a major redesign of the layout.
In 2012 no one would travel in the cabins from 2nd and 3rd classes.
The ship also won't have anything near the facilitates that's expected the
Re:It will be every bit as luxurious as the origin (Score:2)
The Titanic may have been a very large ship in 1912 , but in 2012 it would considered very small.
Would it? Modern car ferries plying the Irish Sea are smaller. Some cruise ships are smaller. Until the Carnival Destiny was built, no purpose-built cruise ship was bigger than the old ocean liners.
Why? (Score:2)
Why this obsession, bordering on reverence, for a boat that sank and killed 1500 people?
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Two words: Kate Winslet.
What can possibly go wrong? (Score:3)
http://www.weirdasianews.com/2010/02/05/shanghai-wonderbridge-trash-collapses/ [weirdasianews.com]
Proof of Unsinkability (Score:2)
Not much detail (Score:2)
Not much detail in the article about how similar it would be to the original. I would hope that it would be "every bit as luxurious" as modern uniclass cruise ships which are more comfortable than first class was in the old Olympic class liners and Cunard queens. Today's passengers would probably prefer to have a bathroom in their own cabin rather than having to go down the hall.
I wonder what they're going to do below decks. Steerage accommodation probably wouldn't be much of a tourist attraction, unless
Sequel (Score:2)
Iceberg II (Score:2)
Will Iceberg II be ready for the maiden voyage?
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Just like Europe of a half millennium ago was a backwater hellhole compared to even the ghetto of modern cities, but for some reason people still dress up and play the part for fun...
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Will it provide the full Titanic experience?
You mean "will Kate Winslet pose for you and then have sex with you in a classic car?" I doubt it. Unless they're really serious when they say the ship "will have 21st Century state-of-the-art technology".
Re:Will it provide the full Titanic experience? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Ah... (Score:4, Funny)
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