Aurora's New Sister Ships - Greg Mortimer and Sylvia Earle

      Built in 2019, the Greg Mortimer was a game-changer in Antarctic passenger ships.  Taking the relatively new X-Bow technology that had been applied recently to cargo ships, and applying it to a passenger cruise ship, created a product that could conceivably enjoy a much smoother ride across the notoriously rough Drake Passage.

      The shape of the X-Bow does two things to create a smoother ride.  First, it extends the underwater length of the ship, significantly.  This is often step one in minimizing the impact of rough sees, as the more waves a ship can stretch across the less impact any one individual wave will have.  But secondly, and more uniquely, the X-Bow allows those really large waves on the Drake Passage to break harmlessly across the sloped bow.  There is none of the “slam, slam, slam” that occurs as traditionally-shaped bows slap violently and repeatedly against each successive wave.  The Greg Mortimer’s ride was described as “marshmallowy” when we embarked, and as a traveler who is prone to seasickness… I was pleased to find that description to be spot on.

      Since the Greg Mortimer was built in 2019, a total of seven Infinity-Series ships - all the same shape as the Greg Mortimer - have been delivered for use in polar waters.  These were all designed on the same platform - 104 meters long and 18 meters wide, with the unique X-Bow design - but each ship is customized to accommodate a varying number of passengers and crews.  Public spaces are also customized on each ship to match the specific operator’s goals.  For example, the Greg Mortimer and Sylvia Earle are designed with fewer cabins (up to 77, though some of these are used by guides and special guests) and more public spaces, for greater comfort… while the Ocean Albatros and Ocean Victory are designed with more cabins (up yo 95) and less public spaces, allowing them some economies of scale that can be passed on in lower cruise fares.

The newer builds in the Infinity Series - including Aurora’s own Sylvia Earle - have applied a few lessons from the first seasons of the Greg Mortimer.   Most noteworthy is the addition of giant glass panels built into the X-Bow itself.  When I was on board the Mortimer, during the first full post-Covid season of Antarctic travel, it seemed that the forward-facing lounge on the eighth deck of the Mortimer had been shunned by a lot of travelers as simply too far away from the normal pattern of shipboard traffic.  (Which was great for a few of us more adventurous folks, as we had it to ourselves!)   It had also seemed that the space in front of the theater, and just inside that enormous X-Bow, was a bit of wasted space.  So I have been pleased to see that on the Sylvia Earle, large parts of the X-Bow were fashioned out of immense panes of glass instead of steel, allowing this area to become an incredibly comfortable forward-facing lounge, amphitheater and citizen science area - on the same deck as the dining room, and much closer to the normal flow of shipboard traffic.