Papenburg, January 2001 - The river passage of the new cruise liner built by the MEYER WERFT shipyard of Papenburg/Germany will be presented live in the Internet on Saturday, 20 January. On MEYER WERFT´s homepage www.meyerwerft.de the vessel´s transit can be viewed from various perspectives. Radiance of the Seas, the new 88,000 gt cruise vessel for the U.S. based shipping company Royal Caribbean International, is scheduled to leave the shipyard on Saturday morning and travel down the river Ems to the port of Eemshaven in the northern part of the Netherlands from where she will start for extensive sea trials in the North Sea. With a length overall of 293.20 meters and a breadth of 32.20 meters "Radiance of the Seas" is capable of carrying 2,100 passengers in 1050 cabins. 577 of the 813 outside cabins have private balconies. The total installed power on board is 78,600 horsepower providing the new luxury cruise liner with a speed of more than 24 knots. Time schedule for the River Ems passage, subject to alteration due to weather and tidal conditions: CET, approx. Saturday, 20 January 2001 06:30 h - Vessel positioned in front of the dock gate 07:00 h - Passage dock gate 09:30 h - Passage Bridge "Friesenbrücke" at Weener 11:00 h - Arrival at "Leerort" 20:00 h - departure "Leerort" 20:25 h - Passage Bridge "Jann-Berghaus-Brücke" 23:10 h - Passage Emden Eastern Breakwater Sunday, 21 January 03:00 h - Arrival Eemshaven, ship moored For the first time the yard´s captain will be Thomas Teitge (Lotsenbrüderschaft Emden), who has many years of experience as a pilot in handling the river Ems transits. There will be some more pilots on board to assist him. The whole team was carefully trained on a computer based simulator to be perfectly prepared for this river transit and to be able to manage even very difficult passages such as the "Friesenbrücke" bridge at Weener. During the transit the cruise liner will be assisted by four tugs: the tugs "Bremen" and "Wolf" (2 x 2,200 and 2 x 2,000 horsepower respectively), and for stand-by and auxiliary services the tug "Hillerdine Wessels" (1,900 horsepower) and the yard´s own tug "Rolf Willm" (1,040 horsepower). During the river passage the vessel´s speed will be approximately 7 km/h. For the first time a cruise vessel will travel down the river Ems astern. This is possible due to the novel podded drive. The pods fitted at the stern "shovel" the water under the vessel thus bringing up to 20 cm more water under the keel. In addition, with the podded drive the vessel can be more easily manoeuvred astern - comparable with the front-wheel drive of a car. Delivery of Radiance of the Seas to Royal Caribbean Cruises will be in early March 2001. The vessel is intended to operate worldwide cruises and features a variety of luxurious cabins, a theatre, restaurants and a wide choice of sports facilities. At present under construction in the yard´s covered building dock is the cruise vessel SuperStar Libra for Star Cruises, Malaysia. The vessel is scheduled to be delivered in the autumn of 2001.