Mighty Ships Returns with New Episodes!
Mighty Ships is back with new episodes. Ships featured this season include G.O. SARS, Africa Mercy, Cristobal Colon, USS Kentucky, Oasis of the Seas, and the Solitaire.
SolitaireSolitaire is the only ship in the world capable of laying huge 30 inch diameter pipes on the ocean floor. Her crew of 420 work 24/7 and can lay down 9km of pipeline a day. Led by a vessel management team, the crew is made up of mariners and welders from all over the world. There's nothing else like her.
Her next job is the most challenging she's ever faced. The Ormen Lange gas field development off Norway's west coast is one of the largest in the world. The seabed is strewn with giant boulders and steep 40 degree drops. A major gas pipeline needs to be laid down to complete the project. Solitaire has been called in to finish the job.
Below deck, kilometer after kilometer of pipeline is welded together, ultrasonically tested and then deployed off Solitaire's 65m "stinger" on her stern. It's computer-controlled, calculating speed and angle to help lower the pipeline to the ocean floor. Forget anchors, Solitaire uses 21st century dynamic positioning to maintain her position in the rough, tough Norwegian Sea. Sophisticated ROV's will guide the pipeline down to the seafloor 850m's below. It has to be dropped in the right spot or the pipeline could break. From beginning to end, from the bridge to the factory floor, to the bottom of the ocean, the Mighty Ships doc unit cover all the action to tell the story of one of the most challenging, dangerous jobs a working ship will ever face.
Oasis of the Seas
Welcome to the future. It took $1.4 billion to build the largest, most revolutionary cruise ship in the world... but will she live up to the hype?
The stakes are huge. When Royal Caribbean's much-anticipated Oasis of the Seas embarks are her maiden voyage in December 2009, she will be packed with 5000+passengers who want to be the 1st to sail on the largest, most revolutionary cruise ship on Earth! Mighty Ships will be there too, living the hype, and checking out the coolest ship technologies yet invented.
Oasis is so big, her homeport of Port Everglades Florida has been re-developed at a cost of millions to accommodate her groundbreaking size! At 360m (1,181 feet) long, she's five times the size of the Titanic and 90 feet longer than the super carrier USS Ronald Reagan. But size comes with a price and demands space-age technologies to help operate and navigate her through the shallow waters of the Caribbean. Even better (or worse), how does a cruise ship load and unload 5000+passengers at ports-of-call and stay on a schedule. Mighty Ships will be onboard to tell the inside story of the maiden voyage of the world's greatest cruise ship... it could be the most important voyage she will ever take.
For more on Mighty Ships and video, visit: www.discoverychannel.ca and www.exploration.ca
