VIDEO: Look Inside One of the Biggest Container Ships in the World

Richard Hammond visits the massive Marie Maersk container ship and gets a unique look at how the hollow interior makes it capable of storing up to 18,000 containers.

The Triple E class is a family of very large container ships of more than 18,000 TEU belonging to Maersk.

With a length of 399.2 m (1,310 ft), when they were built they were the largest container ships in the world, but were subsequently surpassed by larger ones such as CSCL Globe.

In February and June 2011, Maersk awarded Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering two US$1.9 billion contracts ($3.8bn total) to build twenty of the ships.

The name “Triple E” is derived from the class’s three design principles: “Economy of scale, Energy efficient and Environmentally improved”.

The ships are 399.2 metres (1,310 ft) long and 59 metres (194 ft) wide. While only 3 metres (9.8 ft) longer and 4 metres (13 ft) wider than the Mærsk E class, the Triple E ships are able to carry 2,500 more containers. With a beam of 59 metres (194 ft), they are too wide to traverse the Panama Canal, but can transit the Suez Canal.