World’s Biggest Marine-Life Aquarium Set To Open In 2022

The largest marine-life aquarium the world has ever seen is currently 64 per cent complete with an expected opening date in 2022.

The Abu Dhabi SeaWorld complex located in the United Arab Emirates is set to contain 25m litres of water across 183,000 square metres, and provide housing and aquarium fish food to more than 68,000 marine animals, from small schools of fish to sharks and manta rays.

Located on Yas Island as the latest of many mega-developments on the island, its biggest focal point is a 20m tall vertical window known as the “Endless Vista”, which showcases multiple floors of the aquarium at the same time and revealing an incredible level of sea life.

Developed by the UAE developer Miral in conjunction with SeaWorld the aquarium was constructed with SeaWorld’s marine conservation and sustainability goals in mind.

Part of this is set to be achieved through the concept of a “One Ocean experience”, which connects six different and distinct marine habitats that simulate the natural living conditions of different species living together as they would in the wild.

This facility is also set to house the Yas SeaWorld Research and Rescue Centre, a knowledge hub that focuses on marine life indigenous to the Gulf, housing research experts and is available to visitors by reservation.

The Growing Growth Of Aquariums

If Abu Dhabi SeaWorld opens in 2022 as planned, it will be the largest aquarium in the world that focuses specifically on marine life. However, several oceanariums are larger than it in terms of total water volume.

The first gigantic aquarium that was openly advertised as the world’s largest was Shedd Aquarium in Chicago when it expanded in 1991, which housed 19m litres of water and around 32,000 animals.

After this was the purpose-built Georgia Aquarium in 2005, which contained 30m litres of water (since increasing to 42m litres), both freshwater and saltwater to house the many thousands of animals that reside at the Atlanta-based facility.

This would remain the largest oceanarium in terms of volume until Singapore’s S.E.A. Aquarium at Marine Life Park opened in Sentosa in 2012, with a total volume of 45m litres of water as well as what was at the time the world’s largest viewing panel to provide visitors with a sense of walking along the ocean floor.

The current record has been held by Hengquin Chimelong Ocean Kingdom in China, which opened in 2014 and contains a total of 48.75 million litres of water.

The Chimelong Ocean Kingdom also set four other world records when it opened, including the world’s largest aquarium window, the world’s largest acrylic panel, the world’s largest underwater viewing dome and the world’s largest single aquarium tank at 22.7 million litres.

Whilst the present plans for Abu Dhabi SeaWorld are not as big in terms of the sheer volume of water, it could be the largest facility in terms of floor area, with 183,000 square metres of aquarium spanning five indoor levels, each highlighting a different part of marine life.

The facility is set to open in 2022 with the facade, 30 per cent of the acrylic panels and much more work to do to complete the facility within the next year.