Explorer of the Seas is one of five s from Royal Caribbean International

Royal Caribbean International

Royal Caribbean International is a Norwegian and American cruise line brand based in Miami, Florida and owned by Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd.. With 42 ships in service under 5 different brands and one more under construction, it controls a 25.6% share of the world cruise market...

. She can accommodate over 3,100 guests, including scientists making use of a built-in atmospheric

Earth's atmosphere

The atmosphere of Earth is a layer of gases surrounding the planet Earth that is retained by Earth's gravity. The atmosphere protects life on Earth by absorbing ultraviolet solar radiation, warming the surface through heat retention , and reducing temperature extremes between day and night...

 and oceanographic

Oceanography

Oceanography , also called oceanology or marine science, is the branch of Earth science that studies the ocean...

 laboratory

Laboratory

A laboratory is a facility that provides controlled conditions in which scientific research, experiments, and measurement may be performed. The title of laboratory is also used for certain other facilities where the processes or equipment used are similar to those in scientific laboratories...

 operated by the University of Miami

University of Miami

The University of Miami is a private, non-sectarian university founded in 1925 with its main campus in Coral Gables, Florida, a medical campus in Miami city proper at Civic Center, and an oceanographic research facility on Virginia Key., the university currently enrolls 15,629 students in 12...

's Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science

Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science

The Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science is a college and research institute for the study of oceanography and the atmospheric sciences within the University of Miami . It is located on a 16 acre campus on Virginia Key in Miami, Florida, USA...

.

Voyager-class ships are some of the largest passenger ship

Passenger ship

A passenger ship is a ship whose primary function is to carry passengers. The category does not include cargo vessels which have accommodations for limited numbers of passengers, such as the ubiquitous twelve-passenger freighters once common on the seas in which the transport of passengers is...

s in the world, after Cunard

Cunard Line

Cunard Line is a British-American owned shipping company based at Carnival House in Southampton, England and operated by Carnival UK. It has been a leading operator of passenger ships on the North Atlantic for over a century...

's , Royal Caribbean's own and .

Rescue of Tumbleweed

On February 16, 2008, while on-route from Bayonne, New Jersey, for a nine day cruise to the Caribbean the bridge crew heard a faint mayday over the radio. This turned out to be the crew from Tumbleweed, a 39 foot sailboat, who had a planned sail from Baltimore to the Florida Keys. The crew apparently had a mechanical breakdown of both engine and sails. They drifted for 11 days to the location N32.35 W 72.49–roughly 275 miles southeast of North Carolina. The crew of Explorer of the Seas located the craft and rescued the three men aboard. The rescued men departed the ship in Puerto Rico on February 21, 2008.

External links

• Explorer of the Seas official website
• RSMAS/RCCL - University of Miami's Ocean Labs on Explorer of the Seas
• Voyager-Class.com - the largest online resource for information & pictures of the Voyager-class ships
• Research website for the onboard laboratory
• June 2004 article about the ship and lab from CNN
• Article about the Norovirus outbreak from CBS 4 Miami
  WFOR-TV
  WFOR-TV, virtual channel 4.1 , is the CBS owned-and-operated station in Miami, Florida. WFOR shares its TV studio facilities with sister station WBFS-TV in Doral, near Miami International Airport, and its transmitter is located in Miramar.WFOR-TV also previously had two translator stations in the...
  
  
• Miramar Ship Index - Explorer of the Seas