MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Lifetime dream of a floating city: “Freedom Ship”

Imagine a floating community that will travel round the world once every three years. The idea belongs to Norman Nixon a billionaire from Florida, USA, for whom it's the dream of a lifetime.

Apparently in less that a year his company will begin with the project, building a "Freedom Ship", a city vessel, four times the size of the largest cruise, Queen Mary II, with capacity for several thousand people including residents, staff and crew who will be sailing continually round the world.

The floating city will have an airport for conventional commercial aircrafts to land, 18,000 apartments, 3,000 companies, a thematic park, hospital, railway and a budget in excess of 11 billion Euros.

According to the company Freedom Ship International, over 15,000 people will be working in a floating ship yard close to the coast of Belize and Honduras building the "Freedom Ship".

The superstructure of steel and glass will be almost two kilometres long, displace three million tons and twenty floors tall. Since the 300 metres wide vessel will never dock and will always sail in international waters, she will have a port for yachts, Customs Office and a shuttle service so passengers can visit whatever they wish. This is vital since the "Freedom Ship" is scheduled to spend 30% of its time sailing and 70% anchored close to the coastal line.

An estimated 50,000 residents could make the super vessel their permanent home plus 20,000 staff and crew members. According to the promoters of the idea interested parties have reserved 3,500 of the future apartments but the company does not accept advance payments or deposits.

This modern millionaires Arch of Noah version is scheduled to sail along the South Atlantic January 2010 beginning at Bahía Laura, Santa Cruz province; Puerto Deseado, Comodoro Rivadavia, Camarones, Rawson, San Antonio Oeste, Punta Alta, Necochea, Mar del Planta, Pinamar, leaving Argentina early February for Montevideo, Uruguay and Rio do Janeiro, Brazil.

Further information in www.freedomship.com