[imagesource: YouTube / Dutch Yachting]

The initial plan to move Jeff Bezos’ gigantic superyacht from a Dutch shipbuilding yard to the sea entailed possibly dismantling a section of a 140-year-old bridge to make way for the precious cargo.

The bridge in question is the Koningshaven Bridge, referred to as “De Hef” by the local residents of Rotterdam, who have been viciously protective of the relic.

They even threatened to pelt Bezos’ $500 million superyacht with rotten eggs if the council dared take the bridge apart for the billionaire, who said he would fund the elaborate endeavour.

But Bezos’ unfinished 127-metre-high Y721, as it is called, and its three large masts exited Rotterdam waters in another, more serpentine way:

Oceanco launched the 127m/ 417ft three-masted schooner Y721 early this morning. The yacht left the shipyard in Alblasserdam for Rotterdam directly after her launch. Photos by @DutchYachting.
#jeffbezos #y721 #amazon #oceanco #superyacht #megayacht #dehef #rotterdam #schooner pic.twitter.com/ngyFfwHrwn

— Dutch Yachting (@Dutchyachting) August 2, 2022

Under the cover of darkness, reported The Cut, they moved the thing like a “huge, [60-metre-tall] bandit”:

According to a video captured by Dutch Yachting, a yacht-enthusiast news channel on YouTube, Bezos’s pet project left the shipbuilding yard at 1 a.m. and arrived at the yard in Greenport, Rotterdam, sometime around 3 a.m.

The website claimed that the yacht actually took a roundabout way out, passing by four bridge openings to make a 24-mile route, supposedly opting out of an alternative 14-mile route to avoid passing under De Hef.

Here’s that footage from Dutch Yatching:

Yacht enthusiast Hanco Bol said via The New York Post that they had never seen “a transport going that fast”, taking less than three hours when it normally requires nearly twice as much time to traverse the route.

Now that the yacht is in safer waters, away from the egg-wielding residents of Rotterdam, construction will continue in the Greenport yard.

[sources:cut&nypost]