Everything about Rms Queen Mary 2 totally explained
The
RMS Queen Mary 2 (
QM2) is a
Cunard Line ocean liner named after the earlier Cunard liner
Queen Mary, which was in turn named after
Mary of Teck, the
Queen Consort of
George V. At the time of her construction in 2003 by the
Chantiers de l'Atlantique, the
QM2 was the longest, widest and tallest
passenger ship ever built, and at a, was also the largest. She lost that last distinction to
Royal Caribbean International's
Freedom of the Seas in April 2006, but
QM2 remains the largest
ocean liner (as opposed to
cruise ship) ever built, and her width, length, and waterline breadth are unsurpassed by any other passenger ship. Also, the
QM2 displaces approximately 76,000 tons; the Royal Caribbean
Freedom ships displace about 64,000 tons.
QM2's facilities include 15
restaurants and
bars, five
swimming pools, a
casino, a
ballroom, a
theatre, and a
planetarium.
Characteristics
The
Queen Mary 2 is the current Cunard
flagship and makes regular
transatlantic crossings. The ship was constructed to complement the
RMS Queen Elizabeth 2 (
QE2) - the Cunard flagship from 1969 to 2004 - replacing it on the transatlantic route. The first sailed the
Atlantic from 1936 to 1967.
QM2 had the
Royal Mail Ship (RMS) title conferred on her, as a gesture to Cunard's history, by
Royal Mail when she entered service in 2004 on the Southampton to New York route.
The
QM2 isn't a
steamship like her predecessors, but is powered by
gas turbines and
diesel engines that produce the power to drive her four electric podded propulsors. Like her predecessors, however, she's built for crossing the Atlantic ocean, though she's regularly used for cruising purposes; in the winter season she cruises from New York to the Caribbean on 10 or 13 day tours.
QM2's 30 knot open ocean speed sets the ship apart from cruise ships, such as
Freedom of the Seas, which has an average speed of 21.6 knots.
History
Concept and construction
The vision of a 21st-century ocean liner — bigger than any that had gone before — started as the brainchild of
Carnival CEO
Micky Arison, who has stated that his company bought
Cunard to create
Queen Mary 2, not vice versa.
Cunard completed a design for a new class of 84,000-ton, 2,000-passenger liners on
8 June 1998, but immediately revised them upon comparing those specifications with
Carnival Cruise Lines' 100,000-ton
Destiny-class cruise ships and
Royal Caribbean's 137,200-ton
Voyager of the Seas.
Six months later, on
10 December, Cunard released details of
Project Queen Mary, the project to develop a liner that would complement
Queen Elizabeth 2.
Harland and Wolff of
Northern Ireland,
Aker Kværner of
Norway,
Fincantieri of
Italy,
Meyer Werft of
Germany, and
Chantiers de l'Atlantique of
France were invited to bid on the project. If construction began immediately, the liner could be in service by 2002. But it wasn't until
6 November,
2000, that a contract was signed with Chantiers de l'Atlantique, a subsidiary of
Alstom. This was the same yard that built Cunard's one-time rivals, the
SS Normandie and
SS France of the
Compagnie Générale Transatlantique.
Her
keel was laid down on
4 July 2002, in
Saint-Nazaire, France, with the hull number
G32. Approximately 3,000 craftsmen spent some 8 million working hours on the ship, and a total of 20,000 people were directly or indirectly involved in her design, construction, and fitting out. In total, 300,000 pieces of steel were assembled into 94 "blocks" off of the drydock, which were then stacked and welded together to complete the hull and superstructure. She is so much larger than the ships that Chantiers normally build that the shipyard treated her as "1.6 ships."
The
QM2 was
floated on
21 March 2003. Her sea trials were conducted between
25 September-
29 September and
7 November-
11 November 2003, between Saint-Nazaire and the off-shore islands of
Ile d'Yeu and Belle-Ile. The final stages of construction were marred by a fatal accident on
15 November 2003, when a gangway collapsed under a group of shipyard workers and their relatives who had been invited to visit the vessel. 48 people on the gangway fell over 15 m (50 ft); 32 were injured and 16, including a child, were killed.
Construction was completed on schedule. Due to the size of the ship, the luxury of materials, and the fact that, due to her nature as an ocean liner, she required 40% more steel than a standard cruise ship, the final cost ended up being approximately $300,000 US per berth - nearly double that of ships such as
Voyager of the Seas,
Grand Princess, or
Carnival Conquest.
Cunard took delivery in
Southampton, England on
26 December 2003. On
8 January 2004, the liner was named
Queen Mary 2 by her namesake's granddaughter,
Queen Elizabeth II.
Service history
On
12 January 2004, the
Queen Mary 2 set sail on her
maiden voyage from
Southampton,
England to
Fort Lauderdale, Florida in the
United States, carrying 2,620 passengers under the command of her first captain Ronald Warwick, who had previously commanded the Queen Elizabeth 2. Warwick is the son of William (Bil) Warwick who had also been a Cunard officer and had also been the QE2's first captain.
During the
XXVIII Olympics the
QM2 sailed to
Athens and docked at
Piraeus for two weeks for use as a hotel-ship, serving the then Prime Minister of the UK
Tony Blair and his wife
Cherie, the French President
Jacques Chirac, US president
George H. W. Bush, and the
US Olympic men's basketball team.
One 2005 transatlantic crossing saw the
QM2 carrying, in a locked steamer trunk, the first US copy of
J. K. Rowling's book
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, autographed by the author. In a promotional
press release for the event, Cunard said (though without cited verification) that this marked the first time a book had been transported to its international launch aboard an ocean liner.
In January 2006 the
QM2 embarked on a circumnavigation of
South America (the ship is too large to pass through the
Panama Canal). Upon departure from Fort Lauderdale one of her
propeller pods was damaged when it struck a channel wall, forcing the ship to sail at a reduced speed, which resulted in Commodore Warwick's decision to skip several calls on its voyage to
Rio de Janeiro. Many of her passengers threatened to stage a
sit-in protest because of the missed calls, before Cunard offered to refund the voyage costs. The
QM2 continued to operate at a reduced service speed, and several itinerary changes were necessary until repairs had been completed after the ship returned to Europe in June, where the
QM2 paid a visit to dry dock, and the damaged propeller pod was unseated. In November the
QM2 was dry-docked once more at the
Blohm + Voss yard in
Hamburg (drydock
Elbe 17) for the reinstallation of the repaired propeller pod. At the same time, sprinkler systems were installed in all of the vessel's balconies to comply with new safety regulations which had come into effect since the MV
Star Princess fire. Additionally, both bridge wings were extended by 2 metres to improve visibility.
After completing the journey around South America, on
23 February 2006, the
QM2 met her namesake, the original
RMS Queen Mary, which is permanently docked at
Long Beach,
California. Escorted by a flotilla of smaller ships, the two
Queens exchanged a "whistle salute" which was heard throughout the city of Long Beach.
On
10 January 2007 the
QM2 started her first world cruise, circling the globe in 81 days. On
20 February, she met her fleet-mate, the
Queen Elizabeth 2, also on her 2007 world cruise, in
Sydney harbour. This is the first time two Cunard
Queens have been together in Sydney since the original
Queen Mary and
Queen Elizabeth served as troop ships in 1941. Despite the early arrival time of 5:42 am, the
QM2's presence attracted so many viewers that the
Sydney Harbour Bridge and
Anzac Bridge were blocked. With 1,600 passengers leaving the ships in
Sydney, Cunard estimated the stopovers injected more than $1 million into the local economy.
On
3 August 2007 three men were arrested while piloting and escorting a replica of a
Turtle within 200 feet of the QM2 without authorization at New York City's cruise ship terminal.
The
QM2 met the
Queen Victoria and the
Queen Elizabeth 2 near the
Statue of Liberty in
New York City harbor on
13 January 2008, with a celebratory fireworks display; the
QE2 and
QV made a tandem crossing of the
Atlantic for the meet. This marked the first time three Cunard
Queens have been present in the same location. Cunard purported this to be the last time these three ships will ever meet, due to the
QE2's impending retirement from service in late
2008.
Famous passengers and/or guests of the
QM2 include
Queen Elizabeth II,
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, former French President
Jacques Chirac, former British Prime Minister
Tony Blair, jazz musician
Dave Brubeck, former US president
George H. W. Bush, comedian and actor
John Cleese, actor
Richard Dreyfuss, author and editor
Harold Evans, director
George Lucas, singer
Carly Simon, singer
Rod Stewart, CBS Evening News anchor
Katie Couric, and financier
Donald Trump.
On
22 April 2008 the
Queen Elizabeth 2 and the
Queen Victoria met again with the
Queen Mary 2 despite a claim by Cunard stating they'd never meet again due to the QE2's retirement at the end of the year. They met in their home port Southampton.
Design
Exterior
The
Queen Mary 2's principal architect was
Carnival's house designer,
Stephen Payne, a self-admitted ocean liner
aficionado. While the primary reference point for the vessel's design was undoubtedly that of her running mate
Queen Elizabeth 2, her exterior lines also show hints of other vessels. She resembles her predecessor
Queen Mary in the curved forward bridge screen, the tower-like ends of which rise to the bridge wings. The forward whaleback is reminiscent of many
CGT liners, particularly the
Normandie and the
France. The two slender after-stacks are a further direct reference to the
France.
The
QM2 has 14,164 m² (3.5
acres) of exterior deck space, with similar wind screens to shield passengers from gusts as the ship travels at high speeds. Four of the ship's five swimming pools are outdoors; one of these is only one inch deep for the use of small children. The fifth pool is indoors on Deck 12, though covered with a retractable magrodome.
In common with liners such as
SS Rotterdam there's a continuous wrap-around
promenade deck on Deck 7. The promenade passes behind the bridge screen and allows passengers to completely circumnavigate the deck while protected from the strong winds generated by the ship at full speed. One circuit of the promenade is a distance of 620
metres (2034 ft., or .38 miles). The flanking promenades are created by the need to step the
superstructure in, to allow for space for
lifeboats. By
SOLAS standards the lifeboats should have been lower on the ship's hull (15 m above waterline), but for the sake of the QM2's appearance as well as to avoid the danger of large North Atlantic waves damaging the boats in a storm, Payne convinced SOLAS officials to exempt the
QM2 from this requirement, and the boats are 25 m above the waterline.
One aspect of the
QM2 that has been criticised is the counter of her stern. Payne's intent was to make the ship's stern profile similar to that of the QE2, with a spoon shape, but the mounting of the propeller pods required a flat transom. The compromise was a Constanzi stern – a combination of a more traditional cruiser stern with a contemporary box-like transom stern. The design of the stern has ironically been criticized from two diametrically opposed perspectives by liner buffs. Some feel that nothing but a traditional cruiser stern would be suitable for a true ocean liner, whereas others feel that his choice of stern represents a purely visual conceit that detracts from the quintessentially functional nature of a liner. In fact, Payne has specifically said that he wouldn't resort to adding any non-functional elements to the QM2's design purely to make her appear more "liner-like". It can indeed be argued that the stern satisfies a mixture of functional and aesthetic requirements: A Constanzi stern provides the transom required for azimuthal pod propulsors, yet provides better seaholding characteristics in a following swell than a standard transom stern. The stern design, too, has been seen by some as a homage to earlier (especially Italian-built) liners such as the SS
Eugenio C. and the
SS Oceanic.
The vessel as completed does exhibit one other subtle element of visual fakery: the three thick black lines that wrap around either edge of her bridge screen. The purpose of these seem to be to recall the appearance of the crossovers of the forward decks on the original
Queen Mary or on the
Titanic.
In common with many modern ships, both passenger and cargo,
QM2 has a
bulbous bow to reduce
drag and thereby increase speed, range, and
fuel efficiency.
The somewhat squat appearance of the smokestack reflects a fairly late alteration to the vessel's design. Originally the funnel's proportions would approximately have matched those of the stack fitted to the
Queen Elizabeth 2 after that vessel's re-engining. However, the original design wouldn't allow the QM2 to fit under the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge in New York City. (Even as eventually built, the QM2's shortened smokestack has barely 3 m (9.75 ft) clearance under that bridge.) This makes the
QM2 the second major British liner to have her design adapted in order to fit under a bridge at her primary foreign port of call: the top section of the radar mast on the
SS Canberra could
cantilever astern in order to fit under the
Sydney Harbour Bridge.
As the
QM2 is too large to dock in most ports, passengers are ferried to and from the ship in specially-built
tenders. While at sea, these are stored in davits alongside the lifeboats. To transport passengers to shore, the tenders will pull up to one of four loading stations, named Kensington, Chelsea, Knightsbridge and Belgravia, which each have a large hull door that hydraulically opens outwards to form a boarding platform, complete with railings and decking.
Another design decision wasn't to constrain the size of the
QM2 in order to permit her to pass through the
Panama Canal. Noticing that the
QE2 only transited the Canal once a year, Cunard decided to pass up the convenience of the occasional Canal passage in favor of a larger passenger capacity. As a result, however, the
QM2 must circumnavigate South America whenever she wants to go west from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
Interior
Contrary to the traditional practice on ocean liners, the main public rooms of the
Queen Mary 2 are on the lowest public decks of the ship, with the passenger cabins stacked above. This allowed for larger rooms to be contained within the stronger hull, as well as for more passenger cabins to have private balconies - an essential requirement for ocean passengers in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Payne attempted to create a central axis to the two main public room decks (similar in fashion to the
Normandie), but a full vista is broken by various public rooms that span the width of the ship. The dining rooms were placed further aft, though not directly at the stern, as done on some cruise ships like Royal Caribbean's
Voyager of the Seas, where vibration from the propellers at full speed would cause discomfort to dining passengers, as well as where fore-aft
pitching of the ship is most noticeable.
Deck 2, the lowest passenger deck, contains the Illuminations theatre, cinema and planetarium; Royal Court Theatre; Grand Lobby; Empire Casino; Golden Lion Pub; and the lower level of the Britannia Restaurant. Deck 3 holds the upper levels of Illuminations, the Royal Court theatre and the Britannia Restaurant, as well as a small shopping arcade, Veuve Cliquot champagne bar, the Chart Room, Sir Samuel's wine bar, the Queen's Room, and the G32 Nightclub. The other main public deck is Deck 7, on which are the Canyon Ranch Spa, Winter Garden, King's Court, the Queen's Grill Lounge, and the Queen's Grill and Princess Grill restaurants for higher-fare passengers. The public rooms on Deck 8 include the
à la carte Todd English Restaurant, the largest library at sea (the record was previously held by
QE2), a book shop and the upper part of the Canyon Ranch Spa. Also on Deck 8 is a large outdoor pool and terrace at the stern.
The King's Court area on the ship is open 24 hours a day, serving as a buffet restaurant for breakfast and lunch. The overall space is divided into quarters, with each section decorated according to the theme of the four separate alternate dining venues that are "created" each evening through lighting, tableware, and menues: Lotus, which specialises in
Asian cuisine; the Carvery, a British-style grille; La Piazza, with
Italian food; and the Chef's Galley, which offers an interactive experience to food preparation. From midnight onwards the La Piazza section remains open as a buffet until 6:00 AM, when the full space opens again to serve breakfast.
It has been argued that the separation of passengers into different restaurants based on the price of the cabin they booked (the Britannia as "standard" for regular cabins, the Princess Grill as "middle" for those in junior suites, and the Queen's Grill as "superior" for deluxe suite occupants) makes the
QM2 a ship divided into three classes, despite the fact that all other public rooms are used by all passengers equally. Though this situation is similar on the
QE2, it's further enhanced on the
QM2 by the fact that "Grill Passengers" (those dining in the Princess Grill or Queen's Grill) also have a private outdoor deck with its own whirlpool on Deck 11.
As the
QM2 was the first single-class ocean liner built since the immigrant ships of the early part of the 20th century (unlike her fleet-mate the
Queen Elizabeth 2, which was originally built for three classes, and in her early years operated partly as a single-class cruise ship and partly as a "classed" liner), the
QM2 could afford to have a clearer arrangement of staircases and passages that doesn't have to allow for doors and partitions being closed off when the ship is in a "classed" transatlantic mode.
However, due to the arrangement of the public rooms, there are some "kinks" in the design. For instance, as the Britannia Restaurant takes up the full width of the ship on two decks, a 'tween deck, called Deck 3L, was devised to allow passengers to walk from the Grand Lobby to the Queen's Room without traversing the dining room mid-meal. The deck consists of two corridors that run beneath the upper balcony of the Britannia on Deck 3, and above the main dining area on Deck 2. This is why the balcony of the Britannia has tiers that step up towards the hull. This arrangement is illustrated on the hull where there's a stack of three rows of windows in the area where the main restaurant sits - the two upper- and lower-most rows illuminate the dining room, while the centre row serves Deck 3L. There is a similar arrangement through the Royal Court Theatre. As well, the passages that run on either side of Illuminations on Deck 3 ramp upwards to compensate for the change in deck elevation between the entrance to Illuminations and an elevator bank forward of the room.
More than 5000 specially-commissioned works of art are visible in the
QM2's public rooms, corridors, staterooms and lobbies, having been created by 128 artists from 16 different countries. Two very notable pieces are Barbara Broekman's two-storey-high
tapestry in the Britannia Restaurant - an abstract depiction of an ocean liner (possibly the original Queen Mary), bridge, and New York skyline - and John McKenna's sheet bronze relief
mural in the Grand Lobby, inspired by the art deco mural in the main dining room of the original
Queen Mary.
General hotel statistics
- QM2 contains 3,000 telephones
- Passengers annually consume: » * 230,000 bottles of wine, plus 1.5 million other drinks
* 24,950 kilograms (55,000 pounds) of coffee » * 7,000 boxes of strawberries
* 17,240 kilograms (38,000 pounds) of smoked salmon » * 90,000 kilograms (198,000 pounds) of pineapples
* Enough beef to supply the city of Southampton for one year
Technical
Power plant and propulsion system
The
Queen Mary 2's power plant comprises both four 16-
cylinder Wärtsilä 16V46CR
EnviroEngine marine
diesel engines generating a combined at 514 rpm, as well as two
General Electric LM2500+ gas turbines which together provide a further . Such a combined arrangement, known as
CODAG (Combined Diesel And Gas turbine), provides for economical cruising at low speed combined with an ability to sustain much higher speeds when required, and has been common in
naval vessels for some time. While
QM2 is the first passenger ship to feature CODAG propulsion, she isn't the first large passenger vessel to be powered by gas turbines as is sometimes mistakenly reported. That honour falls to the Finnish ferry
Finnjet of 1977.
Thrust is provided by four
Rolls-Royce Mermaid podded propulsion units, each featuring one forward-facing low-vibration
Kamewa propeller with separately bolted blades. (
QM2 carries 8 spare blades on the foredeck, immediately forward of the bridge screen.) The forward pair are fixed, but the aft pair can
rotate through 360°, obviating the need for a
rudder. The
QM2 is the first quadruple screw passenger ship completed since the
SS France in 1961.
As in most modern
cruise ships,
QM2's propulsion machinery is electrically decoupled from her
propeller shafts and her propulsion arrangement can therefore be more accurately described as "CODAG-electric" (by analogy with
turbo-electric and
diesel-electric). The diesel engines and gas turbines drive
electrical generators, which provide the power to drive four
Alstom electrical motors located inside the podded propulsors (and thus entirely outside the vessel's hull).
In a further break with tradition,
QM2's gas turbines are not housed along with her diesels in the
engine room deep in her hull, but instead reside in a thoroughly soundproofed enclosure directly underneath the funnel. This arrangement allowed the vessel's designers to supply the oxygen-hungry turbines with air intakes without having to run air ducts the entire height of the ship, which would have wasted valuable interior space.
Media appearances
Due to a large advertising campaign by Cunard Line leading up to the maiden voyage of the
Queen Mary 2, the ship has already appeared often in international media coverage:
The 2006 Wolfgang Petersen film Poseidon was partially filmed on the QM2; the original film, The Poseidon Adventure, was filmed on the Queen Mary. Though not actual interiors, some of the QM2's rooms served as inspiration for sets on Poseidon.
The ship also appeared in the second season of The Apprentice; the reward for the men's team of Mosaic was a dinner onboard.
On Google Earth and Google Maps the QM2 can be seen at the Pier 92 passenger ship terminal in Manhattan.
In the 2005 anime Blood+, the flagship of the Red Shield organization is modelled on the QM2. Later in the series, the ship was sunk during an attack by Diva and Karl.
In Frederick Forsyth's 2006 book The Afghan, the ship plays host to a (fictional) G8 summit.
In October, 2006, the National Broadcasting Company produced and aired a program entitled Onboard Queen Mary 2 — A Transatlantic Adventure, documenting a typical six day trans-Atlantic crossing of the QM2.
The QM2 appears as the fictional ship Princess Isabella in the film 10.5 Apocalypse, later on in the film the ship meets it disastrous end when an undersea earthquake erupts a tidal wave and capsizes the ship.
In Patrick Robinson's Hunter Killer the Queen Mary 2 is rammed by the Shades of Arabia, a luxury yacht belonging to a Saudi playboy Crown Prince.
In July 2007, the National Geographic Channel broadcast the documentary Megastructures about the QM2.
Footnotes
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