Tucked away onboard the MSC Bellissima is a model of the MSC’s groundbreaking new World Class. These ships will be massive, however, like Genting’s Global Class, we don’t have a whole lot of info about them.
As we like to do here at CruiseInd, lets dive way too deep into what little is released and lets see if we can spot anything.
A video released a while ago, confirmed that there will be a split aft superstructure. This is similar to the boardwalk concept on Royal Caribbean’s Oasis-class. It creates a courtyard-like atmosphere where one end is open to the ocean. There will be balcony cabins that overlook this area too. It appears there will be 7 decks of cabins above the bottom deck. That deck will feature venues (bars, restaurants and entertainment) around it.
On top of that area will be a pool area. One naval architecture trend lately is the limiting of pools high up on ships. A large concentration of water that high above the center of gravity can really throw things off. Interestingly enough, on World Class there will be two pools high on top of the superstructure. However, these appear small.
Speaking of the tops of these, in order to strengthen both sides, you need to connect the tops. The ship will gently twists, hogs, and sags as she cuts through the water, you need to make sure the superstructure is rigid enough. Otherwise these unconnected tall narrow structures will twist themselves apart.
So onboard World Class there will be two bridges that connect the two sides together. The center one (in the photo above) is the most important as this is three decks and located roughly midway down. There is also one more at the very back that is just a wraparound of the sun deck.
The presence of this courtyard will yield an interesting design of the entire superstructure. It will give off a “Y” appearance. In my render below, note the indentation amidships. This is to reduce volume and weight above the waterline so you can build higher. Building higher means higher revenue balcony cabins. The ships that first had this design quite noticeably were Carnival Corp’s Spirit and Vista(2002)-class. However RCL’s Quantum, NCL’s Breakaway, and all MSC ships have this feature quite drastically. On those vessels, the indentation runs almost the entire deck. Onboard World-Class, however, this indentation runs only a couple of hundred feet.
Up top, the ship will have one main pool area and then a large glass solarium area just forward of that. This will continue the arrangement from pretty much every other MSC ship.
Up front we know she will feature a vertical bow as well as the superstructure that continues the bow shape above the freeboard. There appears to be about 7 decks of the Yacht Club including a private sundeck up top. Directly above the bridge there appears to be several large two story villas with what looks to be two story balconies.
Four of these yet unnamed ships will be launched between 2022-2026. Each ship will carry 6,850pax. While it’s not yet finalized, each ship will be around 200,000gt. The vessel will have an LOA of 1,083ft and a beam of 154ft. She will begin construction in Saint-Nazaire at the Chantiers de l’Atlantique shipyard.