Lifeboat capacity

[greenie082756]

I was just wondering if anybody knew what the capacity of the lifeboats are on these ships? Does it vary? Just curious :)

[Sixtytwo]

Probably does vary by make/model but I think I have either seen or heard it is around 200. It also carries provisions for a few days. I don't think I would like to spend any time in one personally! :D

[wichitastatecruiser]

I was just wondering if anybody knew what the capacity of the lifeboats are on these ships? Does it vary? Just curious :)

 

If I'm on board and the ship goes down the 1! :p

[CruiserBruce]

On "these ships"? What ships are you referring to?

 

On a per life boat basis, I have seen life boats rated from 75 people to 250 people.

 

Cruise ships generally carry lifeboat capacity for something like 150% of the actual number of people on board, if you count the inflatable rafts.

 

A search on Cruise Critic will find lots of info, as will a Google search.

Edited April 22, 2015 by CruiserBruce

[BruceMuzz]

There are many different sizes of lifeboats on many different ships.

Each lifeboat has it's rated capacity stenciled in large black letters/numbers just outside the entrance door.

 

One should bear in mind that the capacity is determined by passenger sizes and weights that were established over a century ago - and never changed.

 

Today, when we try to stuff our over-stuffed passengers into a lifeboat, we find that we cannot fit much over 50% of the rated capacity into the boats.

Edited April 22, 2015 by BruceMuzz

[Shmoo here]

There are many different sizes of lifeboats on many different ships.

Each lifeboat has it's rated capacity stenciled in large black letters/numbers just outside the entrance door.

 

One should bear in mind that the capacity is determined by passenger sizes and weights that were established over a century ago - and never changed.

 

Today, when we try to stuff our over-stuffed passengers into a lifeboat, we find that we cannot fit much over 50% of the rated capacity into the boats.

 

Not very confidence-building, that statment. :eek:

[paul929207]

Life boat size varies by ship. Did you have a specific ship in mind?

[broberts]

I have seen different capacities on the same ship. But I believe this is because some models do double duty as motor launches/tenders.

[vacation luvver]

Cruise ships generally carry lifeboat capacity for something like 150% of the actual number of people on board, if you count the inflatable rafts.

But not always! I was on a lifeboat that was being used as a tender when the Celebrity Summit was at Bar Harbor, Maine, and the lifeboat/tender smashed into some rocks and promptly went out of service. The captain made an announcement over the public address system later on that he had to get special permission from the Coast Guard in order to sail to the next port (Bayonne, NJ), because with the lifeboat/tender being out of service, there wasn't enough lifeboat space to accommodate everyone on the ship.

[taglovestocruise]

I believe the largest lifeboats at sea are on Oasis and Allure, but they are just a tad short of being able to hold all 6300 passengers when the ship sails full.

 

from cruise law news 2013...

 

Each life boat has a capacity of 370 people, divided into 354 passengers and 16 crew members who are responsible for overseeing the passengers and maneuvering the life boat. With only 17 life boats, there is room for only 6,018 passengers; whereas, the Allure and Oasis each have a capacity of 6,296.

 

happy cruising, unless your sinking....

[Shmoo here]

I believe the largest lifeboats at sea are on Oasis and Allure, but they are just a tad short of being able to hold all 6300 passengers when the ship sails full.

 

from cruise law news 2013...

 

Each life boat has a capacity of 370 people, divided into 354 passengers and 16 crew members who are responsible for overseeing the passengers and maneuvering the life boat. With only 17 life boats, there is room for only 6,018 passengers; whereas, the Allure and Oasis each have a capacity of 6,296.

 

happy cruising, unless your sinking....

 

Well, we all know how reliable that "news" source is.

Edited April 23, 2015 by Shmoo here

[navybankerteacher]

I believe the largest lifeboats at sea are on Oasis and Allure, but they are just a tad short of being able to hold all 6300 passengers when the ship sails full.

 

from cruise law news 2013...

 

Each life boat has a capacity of 370 people, divided into 354 passengers and 16 crew members who are responsible for overseeing the passengers and maneuvering the life boat. With only 17 life boats, there is room for only 6,018 passengers; whereas, the Allure and Oasis each have a capacity of 6,296.

 

happy cruising, unless your sinking....

 

Your tally of the lifeboat capacity, and how it will not accommodate all passengers and crew I'd correct as far as it goes - but it ignores the significant over-capacity provided by the inflatable rafts. Sure, I would prefer to be in a motorized lifeboat, but the rafts do bring the carrying capacity to a point well over the maximum load.

[CruiserBruce]

I believe the largest lifeboats at sea are on Oasis and Allure, but they are just a tad short of being able to hold all 6300 passengers when the ship sails full.

 

from cruise law news 2013...

 

Each life boat has a capacity of 370 people, divided into 354 passengers and 16 crew members who are responsible for overseeing the passengers and maneuvering the life boat. With only 17 life boats, there is room for only 6,018 passengers; whereas, the Allure and Oasis each have a capacity of 6,296.

 

happy cruising, unless your sinking....

 

Agree with the others. Every cruise ship I have been on (17 different ones) has additional capacity in inflatable life rafts. You didn't include these in your calculations.

[BruceMuzz]

Agree with the others. Every cruise ship I have been on (17 different ones) has additional capacity in inflatable life rafts. You didn't include these in your calculations.

 

But don't forget the crew !!

On most cruise ships, life rafts are there for crew use.

Typically a cruise ship has life rafts for 150% of crew.

And since many crew today are still about the same size they were 100 years ago, we can still actually fit all of them into the life rafts.

 

But since the crew totals are significantly smaller than pax totals, that extra 50%

capacity for crew is not a very big number. That is of course, assuming that all rafts are useable in a real emergency.

 

On my ship a crew life raft holds 35 crew.

When we tried to fill it with passengers, we could get just over 20 bodies inside.

[babs135]

Very interesting statistics. However, I think I'm sorry I even started reading this thread :eek: and will, therefore, not continue to do so :)

[navybankerteacher]

Very interesting statistics. However, I think I'm sorry I even started reading this thread :eek: and will, therefore, not continue to do so :)

 

This is all academic - would ANY of the posters on this thread go on a cruise if they thought there was ANY real likelihood of their having to get into a lifeboat?

The boats are there, but there is no guarantee that they would all be available in the event of their being actually needed. If the ship lists, there is possibility that half the lifeboats could not be launched. They are there "just in case" they are needed and are actually usable --- I would not want to be on a 5,000 passenger plus 1,500 crew ship when the carrying capacity of the life boats was actually put to the test.

[greenie082756]

Life boat size varies by ship. Did you have a specific ship in mind?

 

Golden Princess states they have Lifeboats: 22 lifeboats including tenders, 2 rescue boats

 

Capacity of ship: 2600 passengers and 1100 crew.

 

I'm gonna have to take another look at those lifeboats. I know they are large but to me it seems each lifeboat would have to hold 168 bodies - more or less. I know they are big but that's a lot of people!! :eek:

[Hlitner]

Lifeboat capacity really varies depending on the ship and its design parameters to store the boats. The largest are on the RCI megaships (Oasis and Allure) which can carry 370 persons (we have been on cruise ships with a smaller total capacity). The norm is more in the 90-150 range.

 

Hank

[John Bull]

There are no regulations about the minimum number of lifeboat places on a ship. In fact, with modern unsinkable ships, lifeboats simply spoil their graceful lines so there's a tendency to just provide enough for first-class passengers.

 

JB :)

 

Edit: Sorry, ignore this post. I've just realised that I'm quoting from a book published in 1912 :D

[CruiserBruce]

Golden Princess states they have Lifeboats: 22 lifeboats including tenders, 2 rescue boats

 

Capacity of ship: 2600 passengers and 1100 crew.

 

I'm gonna have to take another look at those lifeboats. I know they are large but to me it seems each lifeboat would have to hold 168 bodies - more or less. I know they are big but that's a lot of people!! :eek:

 

Again, there are also many inflatable rafts to take a lot of people, primarily crew.

[Sat1]

On Royal's Navigator, each boat will seat 153 passengers and 7 crew.

[dsrdsrdsr]

There are no regulations about the minimum number of lifeboat places on a ship. In fact, with modern unsinkable ships, lifeboats simply spoil their graceful lines so there's a tendency to just provide enough for first-class passengers.

 

JB :)

 

Edit: Sorry, ignore this post. I've just realised that I'm quoting from a book published in 1912 :D

 

Back in 1912, so they tell me, it wasn't envisaged that the entire ship's company would have to disembark all at once into the lifeboats. The idea was that the lifeboats would ferry passengers to the nearest ship, and come back for another load. You were seldom out of sight of another ship (except of course when it was dark and you were steaming through an icefield).

 

I don't know how many ships were on the Atlantic at the time, but over a million people every year were emigrating to the USA at that time, so that's 3,000 per day setting off before you start counting the people who intended to return.

 

One would hope even now, with the benefits of radar, radio and satnav, that another ship could appear on the scene before your own ship sinks under you.

Edited April 23, 2015 by dsrdsrdsr

[Lerin]

One would hope even now, with the benefits of radar, radio and satnav, that another ship could appear on the scene before your own ship sinks under you.

 

There sadly have been several sinkings over the past few years (Concordia being 1) where no other large ships were able to lend a hand.

[dsrdsrdsr]

True. But Concordia, at least, was close enough to shore that the lifeboats could have been (and I believe actually were) used as shuttles.

[navybankerteacher]

Back in 1912, so they tell me, it wasn't envisaged that the entire ship's company would have to disembark all at once into the lifeboats. The idea was that the lifeboats would ferry passengers to the nearest ship, and come back for another load. You were seldom out of sight of another ship (except of course when it was dark and you were steaming through an icefield).

...

 

One would hope even now, with the benefits of radar, radio and satnav, that another ship could appear on the scene before your own ship sinks under you.

 

Have you any idea of how big an ocean is? On a T/A you can go days without seeing another ship. Most of the time there are no other ships in sight - and even if there was one on the horizon - say 20 some miles away - it could easily be an hour or more before it could arrive.