Draft / draught of river boats

Hello everyone,

I decided to pull this topic out of the thread "Low waters divert Danube and Elbe cruises". Here is what I wrote in response to ingo_e's post (my post is no. 16):

Hello ingo_e,

Quote:

Originally Posted by ingo_e

Minor factual error in the article: I have never seen a Viking Longship with a draft of 1.50m, usually they draw around 1.90-2.00m of water.

As I have noticed (here and by email), some found it rather tricky to read the waterlevel charts, so I programmed a new feature - a one click solution. It consists of two fields. One compares yesterdays level with all levels from this month of the year, the other is an overall comparision. You#ll see a lot of RED / LOW warnings everywhere atm:

http://rivercruiseinfo.com/content/river-levels

I#ll write a more detailled explanation later ..

The confusion in the info has probably arisen from the fact that the draft can be varied by lightering the ship, i.e. a ship gets rid of some of its freight. A cruise ship can get rid of weight (and draft then) by getting rid of water from the tanks. Which also means less water for drinking, cooking, etc. available. Tricky.

With the Viking longships, according to a German website, the draft can vary from 1.50m to 2m.

A random search produced this: draft of the ArosaAqua 1.60m, draft of the MS Modigliani 1.30m.

notamermaid

What I have noticed is:

While info on length and width of river cruise vessels is easily available on the internet and in brochures in paper format, the draft or draught in British English is very often omitted.

notamermaid

@ ingo_e,

the German site I got the information from is this:

http://www.glamatec.de/pressemitteilungen.html

They make the glass panes for many river cruise ships.

My mistake: the article refers to the Viking Prestige which is not a longship, but was built about a year and a half before.

notamermaid

As I have noticed (here and by email), some found it rather tricky to read the waterlevel charts, so I programmed a new feature - a one click solution. It consists of two fields. One compares yesterdays level with all levels from this month of the year, the other is an overall comparision. You#ll see a lot of RED / LOW warnings everywhere atm:

http://rivercruiseinfo.com/content/river-levels

Just to let forum readers know that this is a link to one feature on a fabulous app for tablet or phone. It also has a feature that allows you to download maps of cities on your route that you can save on your device when you have 4G or WiFi, and then be able to see them when you no longer have service. We are planning a river cruise for next year and I am already familiarizing myself with all the app's features.

Thanks for all the work you have done and for the web site. We are very worried about our Viking cruise on July 26 2014 from Budpest to Amsterdam. We DO NOT want it to turn into a bus tour so we will be watching for any information on the rivers we will be traveling on.

Thanks again.