Cunard to launch new queen of the seas

THE shape of ships to come was revealed yesterday as Cunard displayed the nearly completed Queen Mary 2, the world’s largest and most expensive cruise liner.

The shipping company which introduced the first Queen Mary, the Queen Elizabeth and the QE2 to the seas showed off its 150,000-ton new flagship in dry dock at St Nazaire, in north-western France.

Guests gazed up in awe at the vast bulk of the 237-foot-high vessel, which dwarfed a red London bus which had been placed, for size comparison, under the stern.