Lloyd’s Register (LR) has been named the classification society of choice for Mercy Ships latest endeavor, a new 36,600-ton hospital ship scheduled for completion in 2017.
“LR Marine’s global team – spanning the Americas, Europe and Asia, is very pleased to support Mercy Ships and their partners in the design, build and through life operation of the Atlantic Mercy, enabling this unique organization to continue their invaluable mission and expand their reach,” commented John Hicks, vice president for global passenger ships and Americas business development, for LR.
The hospital ship will be designed by Deltamarin and the vessel will be built at CSIC group’s Tianjin Xingang Shipyard in China. Stena RoRo will manage the actual project construction.
The vessel will be certified as a passenger ship for long international voyages and will be registered under the flag of Malta with LR classification. The main dimensions are 174 meters in overall length and 28.6 meters in breadth. The design service speed will be 12.0 knots. The vessel will have two hospital decks and can carry 500 persons onboard when sailing; when in port, the capacity will be 950 persons. There will be a total of 641 beds in the 277 cabins. The vessel will even house a school for children of the staff.
Upon completion, Atlantic Mercy will be the world’s largest civilian hospital ship and will be assigned a class notation of + 100A1, Passenger Ship, *IWS, PC AC2, ShipRight (SDA, CM, ACS(B), SCM), ECO (IHM), + LMS, PSMRL, UMS, NAV1, Descriptive Note: Hospital Ship.
