BERTHING a large ocean going Liner permanently in a sheltered harbour, such as Southampton, can sometimes create more problems for a ship than facing the storms and rough seas of the vessel's working life.

Many pitfalls lay in front of the plan to turn Queen Elizabeth 2 into a floating hotel, conference centre and tourist attraction. There is strong determination among the backers of the scheme to keep the ship in Southampton, but is persistence and a firm purpose enough to preserve the liner for the future?

Liners such as QE2 were built to roam the oceans of the world and not to be tied up for years at a time. A sedentary life could lead to serious deterioration.

There is also the argument that some ships have such a strong character and are so well known it is better to send them to the breaker's yard and remember them as they were in their glory days.

The idea of preserving QE2 as a tourist attraction is a tempting one but, as some have realised to their cost in the past, even the most well thought through and ambitious plans have foundered on the unforgiving rocks of escalating overheads, such as maintaining and refurbishing the ship, the problems of keeping visitor numbers at a commercial level as well as planning requirements and staffing levels.

If just enthusiasm was enough to keep this type of ship afloat in the retirement years, there would be many vessels tied up around our coastline - but there are not.

It's not just finding the right amount of cash to buy the ship but also continuing to generate enough money every year to keep the project quite literally afloat.

Another big obstacle for those determined to keep QE2 in Southampton is finding the right berth on the city's waterfront that has ease of access for the public, enough car parking for visitors and space around the Cunarder for support services.

Somewhere in the city's docks is the favoured option but this is waterfront owned by Associated British Ports, a group already facing the problem of not having enough space to meet the present commercial demands of an ever expanding trade, who might not readily agree to giving up such a much-needed berth.