Originally Posted by TMOliver

Those poles are called "stanchions", lad, and they're there to keep the ship's superstructure, vastly too high and underbuilt by North Atlantic standards, from collapsing in upon itself. All those enormous "clear span" compartments in the newer ships come with a price, substantially more risk of injuries in any sort of sea state or high winds (or mechanical glitches such as the recent very modest "heel" off South Florida). The large open spaces can only be attained by constructing with materials which are lighter (and have less strength), more synthetics (read "plastic") and less and thinner steel. As long as we're talking temperate climes and "fair and following seas", there may never be a glitch, but ships' logs are full of graphic renditions of voyages which began with no expectations of bad weather (or failure of one or more of the complex electronic and mechanical systems upon which modern vessels depend).

Having been at sea during a couple of hurricanes, I would not look forward to the seas freely interacting with FREEDOM OF THE SEAS in such a storm. Nor, after seeing the performance - so poor as to be literally frightening - of a crew of a modern cruise ship in that "minor" laundry fire off Florida several years ago, would I care to be aboard any one of a number of such ships, literally stuffed with flammable synthetic fabrics and materials, almost all of which give off what in enclosed spaces are "deadly" fumes when heated, when the inevitable major modern fire occurs. Every time one of them goes to sea with a full pax load and a crew under-trained and under-equipped to fight a shipboard fire - part of the lower cost of foreign flagging and less than stringent requirements by the USCG - some of us who have been around for shipboard fires see a larger repeat of MORRO CASTLE on the horizon.

On the other hand, from my days in an aircraft carrier, vessels comparable in size to today's enormous cruise ships, in the class with "jumbo" oil tankers, modern container ships, a few ROROs, and newer bulk carriers (none of which haul about 4000+ fragile-boned lands(wo)men, most of whom would be unable to "lend a hand" in a hazardous situation), I'll admit to one unassailable advantage to "them big boats". When the sea kicks up and the winds blow, the giants are less likely to pitch and roll with the frenzy and discomfort of smaller vessels.