News update – superyacht ECLIPSE now launched: http://www.liveyachting.com/motor-yacht-eclipse-launched
Interestingly, in reality, she looks a bit different in the real life photos than she does in her motor yacht design image, left.
Mr. Roman Abramovich has a fantastic solution for keeping pirates and other unsavouries at bay – Motor Yacht ECLIPSE – the biggest yacht in the world!
Somalian pirates are a real threat to shipping at the moment. Mr. Roman Ambrovich, a well known patron of yachts, is having motor yacht (megayacht) ECLIPSE built complete with a missile detection system.
First, it will have radar designed specifically to warn of incoming rockets. There will also be armored protection around the wheelhouse and the billionaire’s cabin – along with bullet proof windows.
If pirates do in fact do breach the security cordon and climb on board the beautiful superyacht, Abramovich, 41, and his girlfriend, Daria Zhukova, 26, a former model, can escape through secret corridors to a submarine that is launchable underwater and can dive away to 160ft in depth!
Motor yacht Eclipse is due for delivery next summer and is reported to be costing around £200m. She is currently under construction in the Hamburg, Germany by the shipyard Blohm + Voss that produced the famous naval vessel the Bismarck. She will be the largest private yacht in the world and is rumoured to be about 508 feet (155 m) to 525 feet (160 m) long – even larger than Ambrovich’s the others in his impressive collection of yachts, such as the 37 foot Pelorus or Sussurro and Ecstase.
Billionaire Roman Abramovich is famous for, amongst other things, being the owner of the Chelsea Football Club.
If you are surprised that such project will still go ahead in this economic climate, so far the credit crunch has had little effect on the world of mega-yachts. According to ShowBoats International Magazine, 916 new private luxury yachts longer than 80ft are on order in 2008. This is an 18% rise from last year!
