Saudi Arabia has been proposed as a location for the construction of a massive turtle-shaped yacht, dubbed Pangeos. If the project is constructed, it will become the biggest sea vessel ever built, essentially a massive floating city.

Pangeos is named after Pangaea, a supercontinent that existed roughly two hundred million years ago.

It’ll be able to hold 60,000 people, comprised of 9 different bows subdivided into different blocks with 19 villas, 64 apartments, & shopping malls.

Zero emissions and powered by waves & solar.

The project has been designed and proposed by Lazzarini Design Studio. The Rome-based company utilizes 3D technology to visualize designs and ideas.

Shaped like a turtle, a terayatch is set to become the world’s biggest floating structure.

Lazzarini, the designer of this terayatch, Pangeos has estimated the cost of building it to be $8 billion (About ₹65,000 crore approx.

The makers plan on building it like a “floating city”. It is set to be 1,800 feet long and 2,000 feet wide.

Of course, to build a structure that big, the designers would need a special place too. The designers have proposed Saudi Arabia as a location for construction. It will require about one square kilometre of the sea to be dug out and a circular dam to be constructed before the building process can begin. The makers of the terayatch have selected space at King Abdullah Port as the ideal location.

Social media users took to the comment section to express their curiosity about the terayatch. Many wondered how it would handle the waves. It certainly looked like an interesting design to them. A social media user wrote, “It would be interesting to see how this vessel behaves in the middle of a big sea storm, even because it won’t have the speed to run away from it.”

“Projects like this are hard for me to even wrap my head around the amount of time labour materials and money something like this takes,” read another comment.

A third user commented, “Doable concept and not necessarily much forward-facing resistance if the whole light materials structure is made to float on multihulls parallel to each other and cutting through the navigation direction. A kind of a bunch of catamarans all bound together.”

The term terayacht is designated to vessels that are larger than super, mega and Giga yachts. While it might not sound like the real world, the term exists. And this terayacht will also double as a floating city.

Unlike a traditional cruise ship or yacht, the Pangeos itself would be the star destination. Powered by nine 16,800 horsepower HTS engines, the Pangeos is expected to have a top speed of just five knots (5.7 miles per hour/9.2 kilometers per hour).

The vessel’s slow and steady speed is unsurprising given its great heft. Guests wishing to travel between the Pangeos and other locations will have the option to use either another sea vessel or aircraft. A port will be constructed on board for other boats and an “upper shell area” will grant access to flying vehicles.

Funding and Construction

Unsurprisingly, building a massive floating city is not expected to be cheap. Lazzarini estimates that an investment of eight billion dollars will be necessary for Pangeos to become a reality.

An NFT crowdfunding initiative exists as part of a strategy to acquire funding. Backers can pay with cryptocurrency for virtual space on Pangeos within the metaverse.

Lazzarini says construction would take eight years.

For now, Pangeos remains very much in the conceptual phase. One day, however, construction of the futuristic floating city might begin in Saudi Arabia.