Ro-Pax (Ro-Ro Passenger)

A ro-pax (roll-on/roll-off passenger) ship combines a vehicle deck reached by ramps with accommodation for more than twelve passengers, the SOLAS line that makes it a certificated passenger ship. The hull mixes lane meters for cars, trailers, and freight units with cabins, seating, and catering, so one ship serves both freight forwarders and travelers on overnight or day routes. This separates it from a freight-only ro-ro, capped at twelve passengers. Large ro-pax ships exceed 50,000 GT with over 3,000 lane meters and more than a thousand passengers. The continuous open vehicle deck is the type’s stability weakness: free-surface flooding there caused the Herald of Free Enterprise and Estonia disasters and drove the SOLAS damage-stability amendments.