Is a it a warship or a superyacht? Skat, owned by one of Norway's richest man, is painted warship grey and from a distance could be mistaken for a military vessel but inside she is very much a superyacht. This morning she was in the Bay of Palma.
Skat is a luxury yacht built by Lürssen of Bremen, Germany as project 9906, a number prominently displayed on the hull in a typeface matching that of military vessels. The project started in November 1999 and the yacht launched in 2002. The owner was Charles Simonyi, a former Software Engineer from Microsoft and the fifth space tourist. The yacht is 71 metres (233 ft) long.
Simonyi once had a Danish girlfriend who called him skat, literally "treasure", a common term of endearment similar to "honey" in English.
She is now owned by Kjell Inge Røkke, who has a fortune of two billion dollars. Røkke began his career as a fisherman at the age of 18, without any secondary or higher education. In 1979, he moved to the United States to work on trawlers in Alaska, saving enough money to buy his first vessels. He eventually became the owner of American Seafoods Group.
His yacht has an elevator serving all four decks, leisure platform with Jacuzzi, a gymnasium located centrally under the mast, Helipad on the upper aft deck servicing a McDonnell Douglas 500N Helicopter, two jet skis and Motorcycles and accompanying lift.