$450 Million Opera Megayacht, the World’s Best Kept Secret, Heads Out to Sea Trials

Luxury shipyard Lurssen didn’t become the world’s leading builder of custom superyachts by spilling the beans on its famous customers and their watercraft-related possessions. But even by the luxury industry’s tight-lipped standards, Lurssen goes out of its way to keep its projects a secret – and none as much as Opera.

Opera is a megayacht, one that will be delivered to its owner in the early months of 2023. It was launched in September, which was when Lurssen finally allowed the public and the press to see it in full, though it still refused to show the interiors. This week, Opera has been spotted on sea trials: Boat International reports that it is currently located in the North Sea, where its systems and performance will be put to the test.

The video available at the bottom of the page shows Opera in motion. It doesn’t offer anything new from what had already been glimpsed of it, but it should allow renewed appreciation of a vessel this size. At 146 meters (479 feet) in total length, Opera has seven decks and a gigantic interior volume of 10,000 GT, according to insiders.

Trade publications note certain aesthetic elements on the exterior are distinctive of the work of designer Terence Disdale, who previously penned Blue, also for Lurssen. It is widely reported that Opera has both the exterior and the interior by Disdale, on a naval architecture by Lurssen. In fact, Opera is not a new vessel, since the shipyard reportedly used the 145-meter (476-foot) hull of Project Sassi, which burned down inside the Lurssen floating dock in 2018, as the basis for Opera. Opera is like a multi-million luxury phoenix, if you will.

The owner of Opera is believed to be billionaire Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed al Nahyan, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation of the United Arab Emirates. Even if the report is not accurate, chances are the interiors will be shown only when (and if) the owner decides to sell the megayacht. When Opera is delivered, it will officially become the 10th largest in the world, and one of the 61 megayachts in this size category.