World's biggest (and most advanced) sailing yacht

[unixronin]

"The most daring advance in sailing technology in 150 years"

The Maltese Falcon.  289 feet at the waterline.  1,367 tons.  Three 192-foot carbon-fiber masts carrying fifteen sails totalling 26,000 square feet, set and reefed by 75 electric motors.  Computers co-ordinate the operation, but the captain manually controls every step.

Perkins insisted that electronics not govern the whole process.  The vessel would not be sailed by computer.  "No way Bill Gates is controlling my boat," he likes to crack.  "I don't ever want to have to press Control-Alt-Delete to restart, to make my boat go."

I don't know about you, but in my book, that is a seriously cool ship.

And damn, she's pretty.

Comments

[ilcylic.livejournal.com]

Yeah, though you'd still want to have a motor to get yourself out of the doldrums.

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, stipulated. Not to mention to make it easier docking and leaving port without having to wait for a favorable wind. The concept of the "auxiliary steamer", using sail when the wind is favorable and engine power when it's not (or, as radarrider noted, both at once to increase speed while saving fuel), is hardly new.