Too Big to Sail? Cruise Ships Face Scrutiny

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[MokMok]

At http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/28/business/too-big-to-sail-cruise-ships-face-scrutiny.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1 (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/28/business/too-big-to-sail-cruise-ships-face-scrutiny.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1) I read the following article:

One of the largest cruise ships in 1985 was the 46,000-ton Carnival Holiday. Ten years ago, the biggest, the Queen Mary 2, was three times as large. Today’s record holders are two 225,000-ton ships whose displacement, a measure of a ship’s weight, is about the same as that of a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier.

Cruise ships keep growing bigger, and more popular. The Cruise Lines International Association said that last year its North American cruise line members carried about 17 million passengers, up from seven million in 2000. But the expansion in ship size is worrying safety experts, lawmakers and regulators, who are pushing for more accountability, saying the supersize craze is fraught with potential peril for passengers and crew....

[Torslunde]

“The idea is that a ship is its own best lifeboat” - that points out what is in the mind of the $$$ loving people responsible for the great human livestock-carriers.

If/when one of those livestock-carriers is facing in troubles in arctic waters, better hope that the vessel don't sink, because +5.000 people is way too much for a rescue helicopter or assisting fishing boat.

[floatboat]

Thats just the thing.
People are willing to risk catastrophe so long as they make their money back before it happens.