2010 WORLD SUPERYACHT AWARD

The awards were held last saturday at London's Guildhall. Richard Branson's Necker Belle, the Swath Silver Cloud and the designer Adam Voorhees were awarded.

The 33 meter, luxurious and fast sailing catamaran, Necker Belle was awarded under the best refit category with the judge's special commendation. She was refitted by the Azzura shipyard in Australia. The refit included strengthening the structure, up-grading the hydraulic steering system, repositioning the helm stations, and re-rigging with a carbon mast and a new mast food structure. The interior was also taken care of with a new electric system and wiring. The interior was entirely redesigned. To make it short Necker Belle is brand new.

The 133 feet, SWATH "Silver Cloud", was awarded the voyager's award. This amazing catamaran built by Abeking and Rasmussen was already awarded last year with the technology award. It has since then been launched and is sailing around the world. Check his website and the picture galleries, they are amazing.

Finally, the Young Designer Award was given to California based, Adam Voorhees, not for a multihull but for his RA project. I visited his website and I found this very innovative catamaran project Riparian designed to optimize living space on-board.

SILVER CLOUD - 133' SWATH

First Swath yacht I am introducing in the blog.

The best explanation for SWATH taken from SILVER CLOUD's Website :

"SWATH stands for ‘Small Waterplane Area Twin Hull’, an innovative concept for smooth service in rough seas. The buoyancy of a SWATH ship is provided by two submarine hulls connected to the upper platform by twin narrow struts from each of the submarine hulls. The cross-sectional area at the sea surface is approximately 1/6th that of a comparable size yacht and thus only a minimum part of the ship is exposed to the lifting forces of the waves while 5/6 of the buoyancy is on the submarine hulls. Additional stability is provided by the SWATH’s broad beam which is twice that of a comparable yacht. The idea of SWATH was taken from the principle of semi-submersible offshore rigs, which are designed to provide a working platform with minimized motions in open seas"

SWATHs have been used by North Sea pilots since 1999.

Look to SILVER CLOUD's website and you will be amazed by the video of a SWATH and a standard Monohull German Cost Guard ship cruising in quite ruff waters. The SWATH looks very stable even more stable I can guess than a standard catamaran.

As for catamaran SWATH delivers a lot of room inside compared so similar size monohulls. SIVLER CLOUD offer 5 states rooms including a complete owner's deck, with panoramic view, below the pilothouse. A large aft deck can be used as a helicopter platform for a Eurocopter EC120B Colibri. She will be operated by a crew of 5.

SILVER CLOUD is actually being built by the 100 years old Abeking and Rasmussen shipyard, well-known for the quality of their yachts and will be launched in September this year. Interior Designers are Kirschstein Designs Ltd and Susan Schuyler Smith for Spectrum Designs who has received many award for furniture design.

She is for sale through Camper and Nicholsons International.