Aboard the world's biggest container ship

[RDMcG]

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/05/business/interna...

Quite an impressive ship

[anonymous-user]

If you havent read it "Deep Seas and Foreign going" by Rose George is a good read.

[longfellow]

Thanks for the link. I really enjoyed the video and text.

Amazing that something that large actually floats, incredible.

[chilistrucker]

longfellow said:

Thanks for the link. I really enjoyed the video and text.

Amazing that something that large actually floats, incredible.

+1, really enjoyed that.
Pulled plenty of those containers, and been next to a few of those big container ships the size of them never ceases to amaze me.

[RobDickinson]

Been onboard a few container shops but nothing the scale of a triple-e. They are building 20 of them and have recently aid they are going to spend $3bn a year on new ships..

http://www.worldslargestship.com/

CSCL are building some 18400 teu ships now, a little bigger than the triple-e!

[davepoth]

I remember reading not so long ago about the next size limit on container ships - the Straits of Malacca. At that time the largest ships were about 8000 TEU and I thought "not in my lifetime". The "Malaccamax" limit is around 18,000 TEU. Crazy.

[Chilli]

Assuming there were no obstacles, would it be more efficient to run these ships with a nuclear reactor, such as the big aircraft carriers & subs?

[Asterix]

Probably not but the security issues wouldn't make it viable.

[simonspider]

pablo said:

If you havent read it "Deep Seas and Foreign going" by Rose George is a good read.

Yep good book. Rose George is my Sister

[MartG]

Chilli said:

Assuming there were no obstacles, would it be more efficient to run these ships with a nuclear reactor, such as the big aircraft carriers & subs?

When I was a marine engineer ( about 35 years ago ) it was mooted that when fuel oil hit $100/tonne nuclear would be competitive on price. Of course that ignored all the political, regulatory, and security issues associated with nuclear powered vessels - I suspect many countries wouldn't allow them into port for a start.

[markmullen]

I'd love to be the captain of that.

[Chilli]

Lets just say that these issues weren't there. I thought that the nuclear carriers didn't need to refuel for something like 20 years (that may be complete boll ox)...imagine the fuel one of these goes through in that time.

[RobDickinson]

According to wikipedia there have been 4 nuclear powered merchant vessels..

First was the Savannah, pretty much a poster child for every day nuclear power..
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NS_Savannah

The Mutsu cost $1.2bn pretty much ran for tests after a huge lengthy build and rebuild then had the reactor removed..
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutsu_%28ship%29

Otto Hahn did operate commercially for a while 'She had covered 250,000 nautical miles (463,000 km) on 22 kilograms of uranium'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_Hahn_%28ship%29

Last is an icebreaker/merchantman by the soviets.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sevmorput

There are other nuke powered icebreakers though and it somewhat makes sense for them.

I am suspecting refuelling thesedays would be tricky and you wouldnt want your nuclear powered container ship docking in a fair few places...