Aboard Ships and Large Boats
As stated above, superstructure consists of the parts of the ship or a boat, including sailboats, fishing boats, passenger ships, and submarines, that project above her main deck. This does not usually include its masts or any armament turrets. Note that in modern times, turrets do not always carry naval artillery, but they can also carry missile launchers and/or antisubmarine warfare weapons.
The size of a watercraft's superstructure can have many implications in the performance of ships and boats, since these structures can alter their structural rigidity, their displacements, or both. These can be detrimental to any vessel’s performance if they are taken into consideration incorrectly.
The height and the weight of superstructure on board a ship or a boat also affects the amount of freeboard that such a vessel requires along its sides, down to her waterline. In broad terms, the more and heavier superstructure that a ship possesses (as a fraction of her length), the less the freeboard that is needed.
Read more about this topic: Superstructure
Famous quotes containing the words aboard, ships, large and/or boats:
“Our Lamaze instructor . . . assured our class . . . that our cervix muscles would become “naturally numb” as they swelled and stretched, and deep breathing would turn the final explosions of pain into “manageable discomfort.” This descriptions turned out to be as accurate as, say a steward advising passengers aboard the Titanic to prepare for a brisk but bracing swim.”
—Mary Kay Blakely (20th century)
“The ships we sank with women and children aboard. The lifeboats we shelled. Mmm ... we were good at that.”
—Emeric Pressburger (1902–1988)
“There is ... no glamor at banquets—I mean the large formal banquets of big associations and societies. There is only a kind of dignified confusion that gradually unhinges the mind.”
—James Thurber (1894–1961)
“The frowsy sponge boats keep coming in
with the obliging air of retrievers,”
—Elizabeth Bishop (1911–1979)