If you’ve been patiently waiting to pack your valise and embark on a totally not ill-fated journey on a boat named Titanic this year, you’ll have to put that plan on hold a little while longer. The Australian tycoon behind plans for the Titanic II — a fully-functioning replica of the original vessel that sank beneath the frigid waves in 1912, killing 1,503 people — says the boat won’t be ready until 2018, and it has a new route.

Plans for the ship had run into troubled waters recently, as originally Titanic II was slated to make its journey from Southampton, England to New York (the route planned for the first ship) by 2016. Which is now… and it isn’t built yet.

It’s still happening, billionaire Australian businessman Clive Palmer told The Belfast Telegraph, though a few years late — and the route will now be from Jiangsu, China, to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, where Palmer’s Blue Star Line has some business dealings going on.

A spokesman said the project has just been delayed, and the the ship will launch in 2018. Again, the boat will look pretty much exactly like the original luxury liner that now rests in its watery grave on the floor of the Atlantic.

It’ll have the luxurious finishings of the original, including Turkish baths, a squash court, a grand staircase and swimming pools, as well as modern necessities like air conditioning. And oh yeah, enough lifeboats for everyone.

The ship will also be wider than the original to meet modern maritime safety regulations, and the hull will be welded, not riveted. It will be built in China instead of Belfast this time around.

“The new Titanic will of course have modern evacuation procedures, satellite controls, digital navigation and radar systems and all those things you’d expect on a 21st century ship,” said James McDonald, the global marketing director of Palmer’s company Blue Star Line.

Prices for a spot on board the Titanic II have still not been revealed, but Palmer is planning to stay true to that fun class system in place back in 1912, by having separate dining rooms for second and third class. First class passengers will be kept apart from second and third class pretty much everywhere, in fact. We all know there are ways a dedicated first class passenger can sneak around those rules and drink whiskey, have fun and do some jigging with the best of them in third class, however. You just need to find Leonardo DiCaprio somewhere on the ship and you’ll be set.

Titanic II set to sail in 2018, says Aussie billionaire [The Belfast Telegraph]

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