Cruise Ship Submarine and Helicopter Guide: Which Ships Have Them
The brochure photograph of a cruise ship submarine hanging off a crane in blue Antarctic water is doing an enormous amount of work. What it never shows is the six people who paid the same fare and did not get a seat.
Submersibles and helicopters are real, they are genuinely impressive, and they are the least reliable things on any expedition ship. Understanding why before you book is the difference between a bonus and a grievance.
My quick take
I would never choose an itinerary because a ship carries a submarine or a helicopter. I would choose the itinerary, then treat the hardware as a lottery ticket that occasionally pays out.
The math is unforgiving. A submersible seats a handful of guests per dive and a helicopter takes six at a time, so a ship carrying two hundred people needs a lot of consecutive good weather days to get everyone airborne or underwater.
Then there is the regulatory problem, which almost nobody mentions at the point of sale. Several of the places people most want to fly or dive are exactly the places where permits, protected area rules and national regulations make it awkward or impossible.
The quick facts
- What a passenger submersible is: a small battery powered craft with acrylic viewing spheres, launched by the ship’s crane and flown by a trained pilot. It is not a scuba alternative and you stay dry the whole time.
- How many people fit: very few. The Dutch builder U-Boat Worx rates its Cruise Sub 7 at seven occupants in total, which means one pilot and six guests.
- How many people fit in the helicopter: also very few. Quark Expeditions says its ship Ultramarine carries two twin engine Airbus H145 machines with six window seats per flight.
- What it costs: it varies enormously by operator and by voyage, and most lines do not publish a fixed per person price. Some include a flightseeing rotation in the fare and charge separately for landings or dives, so check with your line and get it in writing.
- Where they cannot go: more places than you would guess. Quark states plainly that Ultramarine’s helicopters do not operate on its Svalbard and Spitsbergen voyages.
- Medical clearance: expect a detailed medical form well before you sail. Quark’s expedition contract requires medical documentation ninety days ahead of departure.
- Weight limits: real, and applied without sentiment. Aircraft are weight and balance critical, so the operator will ask your weight and may seat you accordingly.
- Your odds of a turn: never guaranteed. Quark’s contract says no specific activity can be guaranteed on any expedition.
What a cruise ship submarine actually is
Forget anything military. These are slow, fat, glass bubbled machines built for looking at things, and the engineering priority is the view rather than the range.
U-Boat Worx publishes the numbers for the Cruise Sub 7, and they are worth reading before you get excited. Seven occupants, a maximum depth of 1,140 meters or 3,740 feet, and a hull that weighs 14,500 kilograms, which is around 32,000 pounds.
That last figure is the one that governs your day. A craft that heavy needs a serious crane, a calm sea state to launch and recover, and a deck crew doing nothing else for the duration.
The helicopters, and what they are actually for
Helicopters on expedition ships do three separate jobs, and only one of them is sightseeing. The other two are ice reconnaissance for the bridge and moving guests to places no boat can reach.
Quark Expeditions describes its Ultramarine as carrying two twin engine Airbus H145 helicopters with six window seats per flight. Twin engine matters here, because single engine machines are far more limited over water and ice.
The good version of a helicopter day is a heli-landing, where you are set down on a glacier or a ridge that no Zodiac could ever access. The ordinary version is a flightseeing loop of fifteen or twenty minutes, which is lovely and over quickly.
Because flights are short, an operator with clear weather can rotate a lot of guests through in a morning. That is why I rate the helicopter as the more likely of the two experiences to actually happen.
If you have only ever done conventional shore landings, the contrast is stark. Everything I have written about how Zodiac landings actually work assumes a boat that launches in almost any conditions, which is not the standard an aircraft is held to.
The places you simply cannot use them
This is the part the marketing skips, and it is the single most useful thing on this page. Owning the hardware and being permitted to use it are entirely different questions.
Svalbard is the clearest example. Quark says openly that Ultramarine’s helicopters do not operate on its Svalbard and Spitsbergen voyages, and the Norwegian regulatory picture explains why that is unsurprising.
The Governor of Svalbard bans drones outright in all protected areas, prohibits flying within 500 meters, about 1,640 feet, of bird cliffs between 1 April and 31 August, and imposes a five kilometer no fly zone around Longyearbyen airport that swallows the whole town.
The Governor also confirms that in protected areas, disembarkation for tourist activities may only take place at specific mapped locations. Once your movements ashore are pinned to a list of approved sites, casual aerial improvisation stops being an option.
Antarctica works on a different mechanism but reaches a similar place. The Antarctic Treaty Secretariat designates the continent a natural reserve devoted to peace and science, and activities are governed through the Environmental Protocol and its annexes rather than through open access.
On top of the treaty framework, most tour operators belong to IAATO, which layers its own operational procedures over the legal minimum. The practical result is that aircraft and submersible use is coordinated, restricted, and dropped the moment it conflicts with wildlife or another vessel’s plans.
Elsewhere the constraint is national law rather than polar law. Territorial waters, marine protected areas, national parks and archaeological zones all have their own permitting regimes, and a foreign flagged ship launching an aircraft or a submarine inside them is a paperwork event rather than a spontaneous decision.
Weather, ice, medicals and your real odds
Both craft are canceled by things that do not cancel anything else. A day that is perfectly fine for a Zodiac cruise can be hopeless for a crane launch or a rotor start.
Submersibles need a low sea state at the point of launch and recovery, because dangling fourteen tons over a moving deck is where the risk lives. Swell that you would barely notice at breakfast is enough to scrub the dive.
Helicopters need visibility, cloud base, wind within limits and a defined horizon, which polar light does not always provide. Flat light over snow removes depth perception, and no responsible pilot lands in it.
Then there is the medical layer. Quark’s expedition contract requires guests to submit medical documentation ninety days before departure, and the operator can decline participation in specific activities on that basis.
The financial reality is blunt, and Quark’s expedition contract states it in terms nobody could misread. It says the company does not make refunds for helicopter time not used or for canceled helicopter flights, regardless of the reason, and that no specific activity can be guaranteed to take place.
The questions I would actually ask before paying
- Is the craft on this specific voyage? Equipment gets landed for maintenance, certification or regional rules. Ask about your sailing date, not the ship in general.
- Is it permitted in these waters? Get the answer for every segment of the itinerary. The Svalbard example shows a ship can carry helicopters it is not going to fly.
- Included or extra? Establish whether a rotation is in the fare or sold as a supplement. A flightseeing loop and a heli-landing are not the same product.
- How are turns allocated? Ballot, booking order, first come at the desk, or by suite category. This determines your odds more than the weather does.
- What are the weight and mobility limits? Ask the specific numbers rather than accepting a reassuring generality. Climbing into a submersible hatch is a genuine physical task.
- Does my insurance cover it? Some policies exclude aviation on non scheduled aircraft or any submersible activity. Check the exclusions page, not the summary.
Fun fact: a passenger submersible is slower than you are, with U-Boat Worx rating the Cruise Sub 7 at a top speed of three knots, roughly 5.5 kilometers per hour or 3.5 miles per hour. It can stay down for eighteen hours on a charge, which is considerably longer than any guest dive will ever last.
How I would actually decide
If the hardware genuinely is the point, buy the helicopter voyage rather than the submarine voyage. Short flights and multiple rotations beat a slow launch and recovery cycle every time.
Price the supplement as money you may spend and never recover. If losing it would spoil the trip, the honest answer is that this is not the trip for you.
And keep the alternative in view, because it is very good. The core of any polar voyage is boat work and landings, which is why the rules governing Antarctic landings matter far more to your week than any aircraft does.
A realistic word on accessibility
Submersibles are the least accessible thing on any ship, and no operator pretends otherwise. Entry is through a hatch in the top of the hull, down a short vertical ladder, into a seat you cannot easily leave.
If you cannot climb a ladder unaided, or if confined spaces are a problem, this is not a negotiation you will win. There is no elevator, no wide door, and no dignified alternative route in.
Helicopters are marginally better, because boarding is a step up rather than a climb down, and crew can assist. Weight and balance limits still apply, and a heli-landing puts you on uneven snow or rock with no infrastructure at all.
Declare everything on the medical form and then ask the expedition team directly, well before departure. Being told no at the gangway with the aircraft turning is a miserable way to find out.
When to go, and the weather
The Antarctic season runs roughly from November to March, and the Arctic season from about June to September. Outside those windows the ships are not there, so the question does not arise.
Peninsula air temperatures in the southern summer typically sit near freezing, around 0 to 3 Celsius, which is about 32 to 37 Fahrenheit. The number that matters for flying is not the temperature, it is the wind and the cloud base.
High Arctic summer is milder than people expect, often in the region of 3 to 8 Celsius, roughly 37 to 46 Fahrenheit. Fog is the recurring problem there, and fog stops aircraft while leaving Zodiacs perfectly happy.
Early and late season sailings tend to have more ice and more drama, which is good for scenery and bad for launch windows. If your priority is getting a turn, the settled middle of the season is the better gamble.
Quick answers
Which cruise ships have submarines?
Only small expedition ships, never large ocean liners, and the list changes as operators add and withdraw equipment. Check the operator’s current page for your specific sailing rather than trusting an older brochure.
How many people fit in a cruise ship submarine?
Six guests plus a pilot in the widely used U-Boat Worx Cruise Sub 7, which the builder rates at seven occupants. That is why almost nobody aboard gets a dive.
Does a helicopter flight cost extra?
Sometimes a basic flightseeing rotation is in the fare and landings are sold separately, and sometimes everything is a supplement. Pricing is not standard across operators, so check with your line before you book.
Can I fly a helicopter tour in Svalbard?
Not on Quark’s ships, which state that Ultramarine’s helicopters do not operate on Svalbard and Spitsbergen voyages. Norwegian protected area rules and airport zones around Longyearbyen and Ny-Alesund are restrictive.
Do I get a refund if the weather cancels my flight?
Usually not. Quark’s expedition contract says it does not refund helicopter time not used or canceled flights, regardless of the reason.
The last word
A cruise ship submarine is a genuinely remarkable piece of engineering and a genuinely poor reason to choose a vacation. Six seats, a crane, and a sea state requirement is not a plan, it is a hope.
Choose the region first and the ship second. If the Arctic is your target, the practicalities in my guide to the Svalbard cruise ports will shape your week far more than any hangar full of hardware.
The same applies at the other end of the planet, where almost everything begins with a flight to Argentina and a night before the ship. My guide to Ushuaia as a departure port is the more useful piece of homework, and the small ship cruise ports overview covers where these vessels can physically go.
Book the voyage you would still be delighted with if the submarine never left its cradle. That way the only surprise available to you is a good one.
How this guide was researched: Unless a first-hand visit is explicitly identified above, this guide is based on independent research using official port, tourism, transit, government, and attraction sources where available. Submersible specifications were taken from U-Boat Worx’s published Cruise Sub 7 data, helicopter details and contractual terms from Quark Expeditions’ own ship page and expedition contract, aviation and protected area rules from the Governor of Svalbard, and the Antarctic framework from the Antarctic Treaty Secretariat and IAATO. Logistics and time-sensitive details were reviewed in August 2026. See our Editorial Policy.
