david geffen yacht in portland maine

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Gigayacht spotted in Portland Harbor attracts attention

by Ariana St Pierre , WGME

A $400 million gigayacht floating in the Portland Harbor is turning heads. (Miles Patton)

PORTLAND (WGME) -- A $400 million gigayacht floating in the Portland Harbor is turning heads.

According to the Press Herald, a yacht is typically at least 30 feet long, a superyacht is 80-100 feet long, a megayacht is 200 feet, and a gigayacht is over 300 feet long.

The yacht, named Rising Sun, is owned by billionaire entertainment mogul David Geffen, according to CBS News.

CBS News reports the boat's original owner, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, sold Rising Sun to Geffen in 2010.

The Rising Sun reportedly has 82 rooms, including a gym, a basketball court, a wine cellar, a spa, and a movie theater, according to CBS News.

Also read: 'It's amazing:' Nearly $70M middle school set to open in South Portland

It can reportedly accommodate up to 16 guests and 45 crew members.

Geffen’s gigayacht is the 20th largest in the world, according to the Press Herald.

It’s certainly an eye-catcher at five stories high and 453 feet long.

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Gigayacht arrives in Portland Harbor

6th Biggest Yacht in the World Spotted in Harpswell, Maine

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This yacht belongs to David Geffen, the founder of Geffen Records and co-founder of DreamWorks.

Kelly Green-Chartier spotted the luxury yacht off the coast of Harpswell this past weekend.

This little boat, according to the website Super Yacht Fan , has some impressive numbers.

Check these out:

Named Rising Sun
Built in 2004
Cost 200 million
16 guests in 8 cabins
Crew of 45 in 30 cabins
6th biggest yacht in the world

Kelly calls seeing this mammoth boat 'surreal'. I can only imagine. But what's it like on the inside? Oprah knows. Sir Paul McCartney knows. Julia Roberts knows. Since I'm sure I'm not on David Geffen's guest list - let's rely on those super yacht fans!

Imagine that you have a 200 million dollar boat and you bring it to Maine. I think that says more about Maine than it does about the big boat. Imagine, we can go out with a 200 dollar kayak because Maine is our home. How lucky are we?

And check out this sweet gallery of another superyacht that has graced our Maine waters:

Hop Aboard The Superyacht Known As 'Kismet'

David Geffen's 82-Room Megayacht Docks in Portland, Maine

The picturesque harbor at Portland, Maine hosts a number of luxury cruise ships in the fall months, but rarely does a privately owned vessel of a similar stature grace its waters. Thus when the world’s 10th largest yacht, David Geffen’s 453-foot long Rising Sun docked there recently, it caused quite a sensation. The five-story, 82-room yacht took up enough space for several smaller boats at the city’s Ocean Gateway International Marine Terminal. Originally commissioned by Oracle billionaire Larry Ellison from Germany's Lürssen shipyard in 2004, the yacht cost about $250 million to build. The Rising Sun features luxe accommodations for 12 people, in addition to 30 crew members, and features a gymnasium, spa, sauna, wine cellar, private cinema and basketball court that converts to a helipad.

Geffen and Ellison were originally co-owners of the yacht before Geffen took full control of it in 2010. It it is the largest yacht in the world owned by a U.S. citizen. It is not known whether Geffen was on board the yacht when it arrived in Maine, but here’s where a few other billionaires docked their yachts recently:

Russian Billionaire Andrey Melnichenko brought the world’s “coolest” megayacht — a 390-foot, $400 million vessel designed by Philippe Starck and dubbed the A — to Auckland, New Zealand.
Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich brought the 536-foot Eclipse , the second largest yacht in the world which cost around $800 million, to the southern Croatian island of Mljet.
Microsoft billionaire Paul Allen arrived in Iceland aboard the 414-foot Octopus , the 13th largest yacht and the largest expedition yacht in the world.

Jared Paul Stern

Jared Paul Stern, JustLuxe's Editor-at-Large, is the Executive Editor of Maxim magazine and has written for the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, the New York Times' T magazine, GQ, WWD, Vogue, New York magazine, Details, Hamptons magazine, Playboy, BlackBook, the New York Post, Man of the World, and Bergdorf Goodman magazine among others. The founding editor of the Page Six magazine, he has al... (Read More)

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David Geffen's 82-Room Megayacht Docks In Portland, Maine

The picturesque harbor at Portland, Maine hosts a number of luxury cruise ships in the fall months, but rarely does a privately owned vessel of a similar stature grace its waters. Thus when the world's 10th largest yacht, David Geffen's 453-foot long Rising Sun docked there recently, it caused quite a sensation. The five-story, 82-room yacht took up enough space for several smaller boats at the city's Ocean Gateway International Marine Terminal. Originally commissioned by Oracle billionaire Larry Ellison from Germany's Lürssen shipyard in 2004, the yacht cost about $250 million to build. The Rising Sun features luxe accommodations for 12 people, in addition to 30 crew members, and features a gymnasium, spa, sauna, wine cellar, private cinema and basketball court that converts to a helipad.

Geffen and Ellison were originally co-owners of the yacht before Geffen took full control of it in 2010. It it is the largest yacht in the world owned by a U.S. citizen. It is not known whether Geffen was on board the yacht when it arrived in Maine, but here's where a few other billionaires docked their yachts recently:

Russian Billionaire Andrey Melnichenko brought the world's "coolest" megayacht — a 390-foot, $400 million vessel designed by Philippe Starck and dubbed the A — to Auckland, New Zealand.
Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich brought the 536-foot Eclipse , the second largest yacht in the world which cost around $800 million, to the southern Croatian island of Mljet.
Microsoft billionaire Paul Allen arrived in Iceland aboard the 414-foot Octopus , the 13th largest yacht and the largest expedition yacht in the world.

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One of the largest yacht's in the world, owned by David Geffen, was docked in Portland Harbor on Tuesday.

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Geffen is a former record producer and founder of Dreamworks.

His yacht, the Rising Sun, is listed as one of the largest yachts in the world.

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Tenth-largest yacht in world docks in Portland

The Rising Sun, owned by billionaire David Geffen, has 82 rooms and cost more than $200 million to build.

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PORTLAND — The 10th-largest yacht in the world is berthed in Portland this week.

The Rising Sun, a five-story, 82-room super yacht owned by billionaire David Geffen, arrived Tuesday morning at the Ocean Gateway International Marine Terminal. The yacht also was in Portland and Bar Harbor last September.

Additional Photos

David Geffen's yacht Rising Sun came into Portland on Tuesday morning.

It is unclear how long the yacht will stay in Portland, said Nicole Clegg, spokeswoman for the city of Portland.

The Rising Sun is 453 feet long and reportedly cost more than $200 million to build. It has an extensive wine cellar, bathrooms with Jacuzzis, a private cinema and a basketball court that doubles as a helicopter landing pad, according to the yacht’s Wikipedia page .

The Rising Sun can accommodate up to 16 guests and 45 crew members, according to Superyachts.com .

The yacht was built for Larry Ellison, the CEO and co-founder of Oracle, an enterprise software company, according to Forbes.com .

Geffen, who bought the yacht from Ellison several years ago, is a record executive and film producer who started DreamWorks Studios with Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg.

Fred E. Gignoux, a Portland-based steamship agent and customs broker established in 1918, is acting as agent for the Rising Sun. Owner Justin Costello could not be reached for comment.

Last year, the Rising Sun was charged $2.10 per linear foot for each day it was berthed in Portland. Clegg said she expects the Rising Sun to be charged about $2,000 per day for berthing and amenities fees while it’s in Portland.

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Rising Sun yacht: The luxurious world of Larry Ellison and David Geffen’s nautical retreat

Rising Sun is a notable super yacht known for its size and high-profile owners. Here are some key details about the Rising Sun yacht.

Brief Overview

Rising Sun was originally built for American business magnate Larry Ellison , the co-founder of Oracle Corporation. However, Ellison later sold a significant portion of the yacht to music and film producer David Geffen. Today it is co-owned by Larry Ellison and David Geffen.

Rising Sun is approximately 454 feet (138 meters) in length, making it one of the largest yachts in the world at the time. Its impressive size allows for a wide range of amenities and luxuries.

Design and Features

The yacht boasts a stunning exterior design and a luxurious interior. It’s equipped with multiple decks, a swimming pool, a basketball court that can be converted into a helipad, and a variety of dining and entertainment spaces. The interior features opulent staterooms and lounges.

Cruising Range

Rising Sun is powered by powerful engines, which give it a a top speed of around 28 knots (about 32 mph or 52 km/h). This allows the yacht to cover vast distances on the open sea.

Builder:
Designer:
Interior Designer:	Seccombe Design
Year:	2004
Price:	US$ 400 million
Annual Running Cost:	US$ 25 – 40 million

Part 1: Ownership of Rising Sun

Who are the notable owners of the rising sun yacht.

The Rising Sun yacht is co-owned by two prominent figures in the world of business and entertainment: Larry Ellison and David Geffen.

Who is Larry Ellison?

Larry Ellison is a renowned American entrepreneur and the co-founder of Oracle Corporation, one of the world’s leading software and cloud computing companies. With his immense success in the tech industry, Ellison has amassed substantial wealth and has used some of it to indulge in a life of luxury, including the ownership of Rising Sun.

Who is David Geffen?

David Geffen is a prominent figure in the entertainment industry. He is a music and film producer, co-founder of Asylum Records, and a co-founder of DreamWorks SKG. Geffen is known for his influence in the world of entertainment and, like Ellison, enjoys the opulent lifestyle provided by the Rising Sun yacht.

Part 2: Size, Design, and Features

How large is the rising sun yacht.

Rising Sun is a colossal super yacht, measuring approximately 454 feet (138 meters) in length. Its vast dimensions are a testament to its opulence and the array of amenities it offers.

What are the design and features of Rising Sun?

Rising Sun is an architectural marvel, featuring a stunning exterior design and an interior that exudes luxury. Onboard, guests can enjoy multiple decks, a lavish swimming pool, a basketball court that converts into a helipad, and a variety of dining and entertainment spaces. The interior is adorned with opulent staterooms and lounges, making it a floating palace on the seas.

Part 3: Cruising Range of Rising Sun

What is the cruising range of the rising sun yacht.

Thanks to its powerful engines, Rising Sun has an impressive cruising speed of approximately 28 knots, which translates to about 32 miles per hour (52 kilometers per hour). This remarkable speed allows the yacht to cover vast distances during its journeys across the ocean, providing its passengers with access to a wide range of destinations.

Part 4: Notable Guests of Rising Sun

Who are some of the notable guests who have been aboard rising sun.

Rising Sun has been a favored choice for hosting celebrities and high-profile events. Some of the notable guests who have had the privilege of experiencing the yacht’s luxury include:

Oprah Winfrey : The iconic talk show host and media mogul has been spotted aboard Rising Sun, enjoying the yacht’s lavish amenities.
Steven Spielberg : The renowned filmmaker and director has also graced the decks of Rising Sun, adding a touch of Hollywood glamour to its guest list.
Tom Hanks : The beloved actor Tom Hanks has enjoyed the yacht’s hospitality during his time on the open seas.
Bruce Springsteen : The rock legend Bruce Springsteen is another famous personality who has been a guest aboard Rising Sun, making his voyages truly unforgettable.

What makes Rising Sun a preferred choice for such guests?

Rising Sun’s opulent interior, world-class amenities, and exceptional service make it a sought-after destination for celebrities and high-profile individuals. Its spacious decks and luxurious accommodations provide the perfect backdrop for relaxation and entertainment, ensuring that every voyage is a memorable experience for its guests.

In conclusion, the Rising Sun yacht, co-owned by Larry Ellison and David Geffen, represents the epitome of luxury on the high seas. With its impressive size, breathtaking design, remarkable cruising range, and a list of notable guests that includes some of the biggest names in entertainment and business, it continues to be a symbol of opulence and indulgence in the world of super yachts. Whether you’re interested in its ownership, design, or the celebrities who have graced its decks, the Rising Sun yacht is a true icon of maritime luxury.

Technical specifications and additional details about the Rising Sun yacht

Length: Approximately 454 feet (138 meters)

Rising Sun has a steel hull and aluminum superstructure with a beam of 18.5m (60.70ft) and a 5m (16.40ft) draft.

Estimated to be around 7,500 tons

Cruising Speed: Approximately 28 knots (32 mph or 52 km/h)

Maximum Speed: Around 30 knots (34.5 mph or 55.5 km/h)

Crew Members

The Rising Sun yacht typically employs a large crew to ensure top-notch service and maintenance. The exact number can vary but may range from around 45 to 55 crew members, including officers, chefs, stewards, and technical staff.

Positions of Crew Members

The crew members on Rising Sun are organized into various departments, including deck, engineering, interior, and more. Specific positions can include captain, first officer, stewardesses, engineers, deckhands, and chefs, among others.

Number of Rooms

Rising Sun boasts an impressive number of rooms and accommodations, including numerous staterooms and suites for guests. While the exact count can vary, it typically offers accommodations for around 16 to 18 guests.

Other Amenities

Rising Sun offers a wide range of luxurious amenities, including:

Multiple dining areas for formal and casual dining experiences.
A stunning swimming pool with jacuzzi features on the deck.
A basketball court that can be converted into a helipad.
A dedicated cinema room for entertainment.
An on-deck bar for social gatherings.
A gymnasium and spa facilities for guests to relax and stay active during their voyage.
A high-quality audio-visual entertainment system throughout the yacht.
A library and study area for quiet moments.

Support Vehicles

Super yachts like Rising Sun often come equipped with support vessels, such as smaller boats and jet skis, for various recreational activities and transportation to and from shore.

Additional Information

Rising Sun is equipped with state-of-the-art navigation and communication systems to ensure safety and efficient travel.
The yacht’s interior is designed with opulent materials, including marble and rare woods, adding to its luxurious atmosphere.
It has a range of environmental and sustainability features, including advanced waste management and energy-efficient systems.

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The yachting crowd was gearing up for a booming 2020 sailing season. Then the coronavirus happened.

If you were one of the lucky Americans to own a yacht before the coronavirus shut down the country, you were probably on the water.

In the first three months of the year, the average yacht sailed farther than the year before, according to an NBC News analysis of MarineTraffic boat-location data of 514 U.S.-flagged yachts at least 90 feet long.

For the billionaire David Geffen , that meant sailing around the South Pacific on Rising Sun, his longer-than-a-football-field superyacht, which includes another boat, the Rising Sun Cat, which docks inside. Like-minded superyacht owners followed suit, ditching the perils of sheltering at home — customer limits at grocery stories and trading designer clothes for toilet paper , among other struggles — for life at sea.

But after President Donald Trump declared a national emergency on March 13 , ship travel plummeted. What looked like a big season ahead for the yachting crowd turned anything but as the coronavirus spread, shelter-in-place orders were issued and island coastal borders were tightened.

Superyachts are generally at least 90 feet long, according to several superyacht club managers in Florida. The vessels typically have a paid crew on board and come with multiple bedrooms and lounging areas.

“You know it when you see it,” said Enrique Quintero, the general manager at the superyacht club Prime Marina in Miami.

For superyacht owners, the go-to spots before the national emergency declaration were the Florida Keys, the Bahamas and the Caribbean: paradises that had little-to-no confirmed coronavirus cases and were still mostly open. Yachting season for the region was at its peak for the year, with nearly 65 superyachts stretched throughout the region. After Trump’s declaration, four-fifths of the ships set sail for the U.S. At the same time in 2019, there were three times as many U.S.-flagged yachts in the Caribbean.

As states began to issue stay-at-home orders and the country ground to a halt, the yachting season became less about leisure and more about finding somewhere to shelter in place.

“A lot of people had that idea that, ‘Oh, I'm going to jump on my boat’”

Phil Brassington, a Florida-based shipwright who specializes in long-term sailing equipment, has worked late nights and weekends since February to keep up with increased customer demand. Though some of his customers made it to sea, several puttered out around the Keys, stuck stateside because of travel restrictions . From yacht shipwrights to yacht salesmen, work in the industry has picked up as affluent customers come calling.

“I've been very busy, because as COVID-19 unfolded, a lot of people had that idea that, ‘Oh, I'm going to jump on my boat and leave,’” Brassington, who has lived with his wife and two children on their catamaran for the last few years, said.

Covid Tracker These states have the most coronavirus cases. See the day-by-day breakdown.

Among those eager to escape the pandemic was Brian Harmon, 57, a retired restaurateur and chef. As coronavirus case numbers began to ramp up in mid-March, Harmon made plans to leave the mainland on his catamaran, Salty Dreams.

“I was not going to participate in the insanity,” said Harmon, who lives on Florida’s mainland when he’s not sailing. “So I decided that I thought the best way to a quarantine would be to hop aboard Salty Dreams and get off land.”

Within a week he had built a crew solicited from an online sailing forum and had cast off for the Florida Keys. In the weeks since, he’s spent most of his time fishing, tinkering with the boat and watching “Peaky Blinders”on Netflix when there’s an internet connection. His crew consists of a married couple from upstate New York in it for the experience. The wife, an attorney, works by phone whenever she can and the husband is often away on Harmon’s dinghy exploring.

In mid-April, after a month or so at sea, Harmon was out of groceries and had to turn around as popular islands in the Keys restricted travel. At Key West, the dockmaster held onto Harmon’s driver’s license while he deboarded for an hour to get gas and groceries. At Marathon, he wasn’t allowed to leave his boat at all. The inconsistency and lack of freedom drove him to turn Salty Dreams around for a slow-paced float back to mainland Florida.

Despite droves of boats such as Salty Dreams sailing home, yacht salesmen are keeping busy, according to Michael Costa, a salesman based in California. His company, SeaNet , deals in selling whole yachts and shares of yachts, akin to a timeshare.

In the past few weeks, he’s seen an increase in families drawn to the fractional ownership program, which has a price tag starting at $250,000. Most customers, Costa said, are interested in weekend getaways.

“I think that people are looking at private yachting as a very interesting alternative in this environment,” Costa said. “People are rethinking their vacation trips to Europe or having to travel long distances as it relates to getting on a plane.”

Ports close, add restrictions

Most islands in the Caribbean, such as the Bahamas and the U.S. Virgin Islands have implemented restrictions similar to those in the Florida Keys, allowing few ships out and fewer in. Yachters have been left with two options: shelter-in-place until the waters open or retreat stateside.

The island clusters are gathering spots for a majority of superyachts outside the U.S. After seaports began closing in the Florida Keys in late March, many superyachts set sail toward islands in the Caribbean, which started closing soon after.

Bahamian Prime Minister Hubert Minnis sent in warships from the Royal Bahamas Defense Force in early April to prevent unauthorized ships from traveling the islands without written permission.

For Katie Gasper, 39, who has been living at sea for years with her husband and 11-year-old son aboard a 65-foot yacht, the crackdown meant staying put.

Gasper, a former physician assistant and current stay-at-yacht mom, and her family were in the U.S. Virgin Islands in mid-March, a day after the Islands confirmed its first coronavirus case. If it weren’t for prior docking reservations, the family wouldn’t have been allowed in .The island’s shelter-in-place rules are similar to those stateside: Nonessential businesses have temporarily closed, restaurants are limited to takeout and delivery, and gatherings of more than 10 people are prohibited.

COVID TRACKER Map of how many coronavirus cases have been confirmed across the country

They’re still allowed to travel on land throughout St. Thomas, but the limitations have started to bite at their day-to-day schedule. Since March, their typical day isn’t that different than before the pandemic: biking, homeschooling, board games and yoga. Gasper said the most uncomfortable difference is the lack of human contact.

“We don't really hang out with people,” Gasper said. “Drinking at sundown is a really big thing for sailors. We've done it only once in the past three or four weeks with friends of ours that are an older couple. We just sat 6 feet apart from each other on the dock getting drunk.”

The Gaspers are staying put until further notice, postponing a loosely planned trip that would have taken them through the Panama Canal and toward Australia, where Gasper’s husband dreamed of staying for a few months. She said the family feels safer docked in the islands than they would stateside, largely because of the distance between themselves and coronavirus hot spots.

The port they’re docked in, Charlotte Amalie, had been crowded for weeks, Gasper said. But after the island’s social distancing measures went into effect, the superyachts cleared out and headed for Florida’s beaches, which Gov. Ron DeSantis opened portions of two weeks later .

“It was kind of just like business as usual here,” Gasper said. “A lot of the megayachts were coming and going and partying. Now many of the boats are returning to the U.S. prematurely. They're either sailing up there or being shipped on freighters up there. It's emptied out quite a bit.”

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Tenth-largest yacht in world docks in Portland

The Rising Sun, owned by billionaire David Geffen, has 82 rooms and cost more than $200 million to build.

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PORTLAND — The 10th-largest yacht in the world is berthed in Portland this week.

Additional Photos

It is unclear how long the yacht will stay in Portland, said Nicole Clegg, spokeswoman for the city of Portland.

The Rising Sun can accommodate up to 16 guests and 45 crew members, according to Superyachts.com .

The yacht was built for Larry Ellison, the CEO and co-founder of Oracle, an enterprise software company, according to Forbes.com .

Geffen, who bought the yacht from Ellison several years ago, is a record executive and film producer who started DreamWorks Studios with Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenberg.

Fred E. Gignoux, a Portland-based steamship agent and customs broker established in 1918, is acting as agent for the Rising Sun. Owner Justin Costello could not be reached for comment.

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Hollywood billionaire David Geffen has been self-isolating on his superyacht in the Caribbean during the coronavirus pandemic. Take a look at the $590 million yacht.

Billionaire David Geffen is in the hot seat for a "tone-deaf" Instagram post about isolating on his yacht, Rising Sun, in the Caribbean, The Guardian reported .
Geffen reportedly paid $590 million for the yacht, which previously belonged to Oracle founder Larry Ellison .
Rising Sun is something of a playground for the rich and famous, as Geffen has been known to host celebrities like Oprah Winfrey and Leonardo DiCaprio on board.
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos was spotted on the superyacht last summer.
Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories .

Billionaire and entertainment mogul David Geffen is in the hot seat this week for a "tone-deaf" Instagram post about isolating on his $590 million yacht in the Caribbean during the coronavirus pandemic, The Guardian reported .

On Saturday, Geffen posted photos showing his superyacht, Rising Sun, in the Grenadines with the caption, "Sunset last night. Isolated in the Grenadines avoiding the virus. I hope everybody is staying safe." The backlash on Twitter was prompt, with people calling his post "shameful" and out of touch, reported Business Insider's Katie Warren . He appears to have since deactivated his Instagram .

It's the same yacht that Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos was spotted on in the Balearics, Spain, last summer. In a photo posted to Geffen's Instagram , Bezos was seen with his girlfriend, Lauren Sanchez; the supermodel Karlie Kloss; and former Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein.

But Bezos and crew aren't the first to cruise the high seas with Geffen, who appears to love hosting celebrities, musicians, and actors. Leonardo DiCaprio, Bradley Cooper, Oprah Winfrey, and Barack and Michelle Obama have also previously kicked back on Geffen's 400-foot-plus superyacht.

Here's a look at Rising Sun — and the big names who have been on board.

The entertainment mogul David Geffen, founder of DreamWorks, SKG, Asylum Records, Geffen Records, and DGS Records, owns Rising Sun. According to Forbes, he's worth an estimated $7.8 billion.

Source : Forbes

The 454-foot megayacht was originally built for Oracle founder Larry Ellison. Geffen bought a half-share in 2007 and the other half in 2010, totaling $590 million.

Source : Forbes

The exact value of the superyacht is unclear. However, a 2019 put its value at $300 million.

Source : Yacht Harbour

Rising Sun was constructed by the German shipbuilder Lurssen. Once Geffen became owner, he had the yacht refitted over a six-month period.

Source : Boat International

The yacht can accommodate 18 guests and a staff of 55 people. It even has a basketball court.

The top deck is dedicated entirely to the owner and includes a double-height cinema.

Geffen has cruised everywhere from St. Bart's and the Tobago Cays in the Caribbean to Portofino, Italy, and Ibiza, Spain, according to posts Business Insider previously viewed on his now-deactivated Instagram — but not without a few friends.

Rising Sun is a great place for entertaining. A scroll through Geffen's Instagram feed before it was deleted showed that he's hosted many a celebrity guest on board.

Oprah Winfrey, Bradley Cooper, Orlando Bloom, Katy Perry, Chris Rock, Bruce Springsteen, Mariah Carey, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Tom Hanks have all joined Geffen in cruising the high seas, according to now-deleted Instagram posts.

♥️ happiness entrepreneurs ♥️ A post shared by KATY PERRY (@katyperry) on Jul 28, 2019 at 8:57am PDT Jul 28, 2019 at 8:57am PDT

Source : Business Insider , GQ

But Geffen doesn't just invite actors and musicians on board. In 2017, Barack and Michelle Obama were spotted on board while the yacht was in French Polynesia.

Source : Business Insider

And in summer 2019, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, investment banker Lloyd Blankfein, and supermodel Karlie Kloss were spotted aboard in the Balearics in Spain.

But Geffen likely won't have any friends on board anytime soon during the coronavirus pandemic.

On Saturday, he posted a photo to his Instagram from Rising Sun. The caption read: "Sunset last night. Isolated in the Grenadines avoiding the virus. I hope everybody is staying safe."

Twitter lit up with backlash, with people calling his post "shameful" and out of touch. Geffen then deleted his Instagram.

—Robby Starbuck (@robbystarbuck) March 28, 2020

Source : Twitter

While the combined $590 million that Geffen spent to buy Rising Sun is an astronomical figure, it pales in comparison to the world's most expensive yacht. That title goes to the Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich's yacht Eclipse, which is estimated to be worth anywhere from $600 million to $1.5 billion.

Source: Business Insider

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David Geffen may have stopped posting pics from his megayacht after backlash, but that hasn’t stopped others from buzzing about his boat, Rising Sun.

The $590 million yacht was seen this week off the Maine coast.

Two weeks ago, it made a refueling stop in New Bedford, Mass.

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Inside The Rising Sun: David Geffen's $590 Million Superyacht

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Lucky 007s: ranking james bond movies by box office performance, sony sets record buying queen's music catalog for over $1 billion, quick links, details of the yacht, interior and exterior details, the rising sun’s onboard comfort and entertainment.

Billionaire and entertainment mogul David Geffen reportedly purchased the superyacht for $590 million from the Oracle founder Larry Ellison. It was reported that wealthy people love spending money on yachts, and about 88% of the luxury market can be associated to spending on yachts. For this reason, it is not at all surprising that billionaires are spending so much money buying yachts . Yachts can be considered as the pinnacle of luxury and decadence and about $22 billion annually are spent on Yachts by the wealthy people. The Rising Sun has hosted numerous famous celebrities including American talk show host Oprah Winfrey and Academy Award winner Leonardo DiCaprio on board and even Amazon founder Jeff Bezos was seen hanging out in the superyacht.

Geffen has cruised everywhere using the Superyacht from St. Bart's in the Caribbean to Portofino to Italy and even Ibiza, Spain. He loves travelling using his yacht but not without his friends and some high profile celebrities. Among the guests in his massive yacht are Julia Roberts, Maria Shriver, Steven Spielberg, JJ Abrams, Karlie Kloss, Peter Harrington-Cressman, Paul McCartney and even Michelle and Barack Obama. Take a look inside the majestic yacht of Geffen.

RELATED: Inside The Flying Fox: Jeff Bezos' $400 Million Mega Yacht

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The Rising Sun is a motor yacht which was designed by Jon Bannenberg and was built and constructed in 2004 by German shipbuilder Lürssen. The yacht reportedly costs $200 million to build. The yacht was built at Lürssen’s Bremen shipyard for the founder and CEO of Oracle Corporation, Larry Ellison. It was delivered to Ellison in June 2004. Since 2010, David Geffen has owned the yacht. Geffen bought half of the share of the 454-foot megayacht in 2007 and decided to buy the yacht in full in 2010 which totaled his payment for $590 million. The exact estimated value of the yacht is still unclear but as of 2019, the yacht was valued for $300 million. After Geffen bought it, he had the yacht refitted in the period of just six months.

The motor yacht has a tonnage of 7,841 GT and has a length of 138 m that is about 452 ft 9 in. It utilizes the installed power of the diesel engine of 4 × MTU 20V 8000 M90 with 36,000 kW. It also has 4 propellers as its propulsion and has the speed of 28 knots that can comfortably run at the speed of 26 knots but can run at the maximum speed of 30 knots. It was built with steel hull and an aluminum superstructure that includes a teak deck. It also features an anchor stabilizer which provides the people on board an exceptional comfort. Unlike some other luxury yachts, the Rising Sun is not available for private charter.

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The superyacht has about eighty two rooms and has the ability to accommodate about 18 guests and 55 staff and crew members. The eighteen guests can comfortably stay in the nine suites at the yacht which can ensure a relaxed luxury yacht experience . The massive yacht even has a basketball court on board. The top deck is entirely dedicated to the owner which includes a double-height cinema. Aside from the basketball court, there is also a wine cellar and a movie theater which can be found among the eighty two rooms of the yacht.

The interior design of the yacht was designed by design house Seccombe Design. The exterior design on the other hand was designed by Bannenberg & Rowell and was refitted in 2011 after David Geffen has requested for it. The builders of the Rising Sun have experimented with the extensive use of some structural glass that gives off a clean and stripped-down profile for the yacht. This includes the builders extensively working on the engineering and systems of the yacht. The exposure of the yacht’s structure is one of the overarching themes in the superyacht’s design.

https://www.pinterest.ph/pin/400961173065183662/

There is a reason why a lot of famous celebrities and public figure enjoy hanging out at the superyacht. For the added comfort and entertainment, there is a sauna, underwater lights, beauty salon, elevator and gym at the superyacht. It offers the luxuries of the land space on a secluded area which gives them the privacy that they need. The general arrangement of the layout of the Rising Sun has given the guests spacious cabins which have a direct access to the exterior side decks of the yacht. With the use of the 45-degree indents in the yacht’s superstructure, the guests are also protected from the weather.

The yacht has so much space that the guests can roam around and just party. The top deck was designed entirely for the owner’s entertainment. The guests can also enjoy the double-height cinema which was embedded just like the stone of the avocado.

READ NEXT: Inside SYMPHONY: Bernard Arnault's $150 Million Yacht

Sources: Business Insider , Luxury Launches , Yacht Charter Fleet , Boat International

Poisoned trees gave a wealthy couple in Maine a killer ocean view. Residents wonder, at what cost?

C AMDEN, Maine (AP) — Suspicious deaths in an idyllic seaside community and detective work that points to poison sound like themes from a classic murder mystery. But the victims in this Maine whodunnit were trees that stood in the way of a wealthy family’s oceanfront view, allegedly felled by well-heeled killers who, while ostracized and publicly shamed, remain free.

Wealth and hubris fuel the tale of a politically connected Missouri couple who allegedly poisoned their neighbor’s trees to secure their million-dollar view of Camden Harbor. The incident that was unearthed by the victim herself — the philanthropic wife of L.L. Bean’s late president — has united local residents in outrage.

To make matters worse, the herbicide used to poison the trees leached into a neighboring park and the town’s only public seaside beach. The state attorney general is now investigating.

“Anybody dumb enough to poison trees right next to the ocean should be prosecuted, as far as I’m concerned,” said Paul Hodgson, echoing the view of many exasperated residents in Camden, a community of 5,000 nestled at the foot of mountains that sweep upward from the Atlantic Ocean and overlook a harbor filled with lobster boats, yachts and schooners.

If this were a made-for-TV drama, the story set against the backdrop of this quaint village would have it all: Wealthy out-of-state villains, a sleuthing member of the venerable L.L. Bean family, and the same powerful chemical used to avenge Alabama’s loss on the football field to archrival Auburn.

Amelia Bond, former CEO of the St. Louis Foundation, which oversees charitable funds with more than $500 million in assets, brought the herbicide from Missouri in 2021 and applied it near oak trees on the waterfront property of Lisa Gorman, wife of the late Leon Gorman, L.L. Bean’s president and grandson of L.L. himself, according to a pair of consent agreements with the town and the state pesticide board.

Bond’s husband, Arthur Bond III, is an architect and the nephew of former U.S. Sen. Kit Bond. Their summer home, owned by a trust, is situated directly behind Gorman's home, farther up the hill.

When the trees and other vegetation began dying, Amelia Bond told Gorman in June 2022 that the tree didn’t look good and offered to share the cost of removing them, Gorman's lawyer wrote in a document.

Instead, Gorman had the trees tested. Soon, lawyers were involved.

More than $1.7 million in fines and settlements later, the trees are now gone and the harbor view from the Bond’s home is improved. But the chemical has leached into a neighboring park and beach, leaving the Bonds potentially on the hook for further monitoring and remediation, and Maine's attorney general has agreed to further investigate the incident.

The herbicide — Tebuthiuron — was the same one used in 2010 by an angry Alabama football fan to kill the Toomer’s Corner oak trees at Auburn University, following a Crimson Tide loss to their archrival. The incident earned jail time for Harvey Updyke, who acknowledged poisoning the trees.

Tebuthiuron contaminates soil and doesn’t break down, so it continues to kill plants. At Auburn University, it took the removal of about 1,780 tons (1,615 metric tons) of contaminated material to achieve negligible levels of the chemical in the soil.

Short of removing the soil, the only other solution is dilution — waiting for nature to thin out the concentration of the herbicide to safe levels for plants. It could take six months to two years for it to be diluted enough to no longer endanger to plants, said Scott McElroy, an Auburn professor specializing in weed science and herbicide chemistry.

Back in Maine, Tom Hedstrom, chair of the Select Board, said his job typically requires finding consensus on how to proceed with delicate political matters. But this time there is no need because residents are united in their anger.

Hedstrom said he, too, is appalled by the behavior.

“Wealth and power don’t always go hand in hand with intelligence, education and morals,” he said. “This was atrocious and gross and any other word you want to use to describe abhorrent behavior.”

The Bonds have paid a price for their actions, which they acknowledged in the consent agreements.

They paid $4,500 to resolve Maine Board of Pesticides Control Board violations for unauthorized use of an herbicide that was applied inappropriately and not allowed for residential use, $180,000 to resolve violations with the town and another $30,000 for additional environmental testing, according to documents. They also paid more than $1.5 million to Gorman in a legal settlement, according to a memo from Jeremy Martin, the town's planning and development director.

A lawyer for the Bonds said they have no comment, but they “continue to take the allegations against them seriously. They continue to cooperate with the town of Camden, state of Maine and the Gormans, as they have done over the last two years.”

A lawyer for Gorman declined comment.

Rep. Vicki Doudera, D-Camden, said she intends to address the $4,500 maximum fine that the Maine Board of Pesticide Control Board was allowed to assess. One of her ideas is a sliding scale that accounts for scope of damage and intent.

“It makes me so livid," Doudera said. "This situation, the minute I heard about it, I thought, ’Wow! These people are going to get a slap on the wrist. That’s just not right."

On a recent afternoon, no one was home at the Bond's residence while people walked their dogs less than 500 feet (150 meters) away on Laite Memorial Beach, where the herbicide that's lethal to aquatic plants has been detected.

Camden resident Dwight Johnson described as “underhanded” the way Amelia Bond feigned being a good neighbor by offering to share the costs of removing trees that she'd poisoned. Lynn Harrington, another town resident, questioned whether the Bonds could show their faces around town, where they used to be members of the Camden Yacht Club.

Some residents say the episode fits with the well-worn stereotype of wealthy summer residents “from away” — the Maine term for outsiders — running roughshod over full-time residents.

But some residents pushed back against casting summer residents as trouble makers.

Hodgson said Camden is not without its own rule-bending characters in a community where there are plenty of year-round residents who are both wealthy and entitled. He said some residents in the community where the median income is just under $93,000 — high for Maine, the poorest state in New England -- have been known to cut down trees, knowing it’s illegal.

“They just pay the fine because they have plenty of money,” Hodgson said. “That’s the town we live in.”

This story has been corrected to show the Bonds are no longer members of the Camden Yacht Club.

Follow David Sharp on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, @David_Sharp_AP

The homes of Lisa Gorman, front, and Amelia and Arthur Bond are seen, Tuesday, June 4, 2024, in Camden, Maine. The Bond's, a wealthy politically connected Missouri couple poisoned their neighbor's trees to secure a view of Camden Harbor, outraging residents in the seaside community.(AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

Live Updates: Heat Wave Pummels Eastern U.S. for 4th Day

Sweaty swaths of the Northeast and the lower Midwest are forecast to bake again. Some 94 million Americans are under extreme heat advisories, watches or warnings, according to the National Weather Service.

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Coney Island, N.Y. Spencer Platt/Getty Images
Wiscasset, Maine Ryan David Brown for The New York Times
Schenectady, N.Y. Cindy Schultz for The New York Times
Tuscon, Ariz. Cassidy Araiza for The New York Times
Whiteland, Ind. Kaiti Sullivan for The New York Times

Andy Newman

Here’s what to know about the heat.

More than a quarter of the population of the United States was under an excessive-heat advisory on the first day of summer as a smothering heat wave covering much of the eastern half of the country dragged on through a fourth day on Thursday — with more to come.

A high-pressure system called a heat dome continued to scorch cities in a vast swath of the country from the lower Midwest to the Northeast, with cities from Terre Haute, Ind., to Bar Harbor, Maine, expected to face temperatures in the mid- to upper-90s. The National Weather Service’s “heat risk map” for Thursday is stained deep purple, for the highest risk category, across most of Ohio, northern Pennsylvania, southern Maine and New York’s Southern Tier.

Here are the details:

School’s out for some: A number of school districts in the New York City suburbs sent students home early on Thursday because of the high temperatures. The city’s schools — which are in session until next Wednesday — were operating as normal. “We’re fortunate that, for the most part, our instructional spaces, our classrooms, have air conditioning,” said Daniel Weisberg, the first deputy chancellor for the city school system. The vast majority of students, he said, will not be “feverishly fanning themselves.”

A blistering heat dome : The meteorological phenomenon, a high-pressure system in the outer reaches of the atmosphere, has locked the heat in place. The heat index on Wednesday broke 100 in some areas of central Maine; in Albany and Rochester, N.Y.,; and in Manchester, N.H. The unlikely location of Caribou, Maine, near the state’s northern border with Canada, tied its record high temperature of 96 degrees.

Hot nights : Perhaps even worse than daytime highs for those without air-conditioning, record warm overnight temperatures on Thursday “will prevent natural cooling and allow the heat danger to build over time,” the Weather Service said.

When will it end? : That depends where you are . The Weather Service said that conditions in New England should improve by Friday , when a cold front moves in. New York will remain sultry through the weekend, and the Mid-Atlantic should continue to have temperatures 10 to 15 degrees above normal into Sunday, with a brief reprieve on Monday — though this could be short-lived, as higher temperatures are likely to return to the region by midweek.

Next up, the Great Plains : The worst is yet to come for cities like Wichita, Kan., and Lincoln, Neb., which have been spared so far this year. By early next week, they will see heat indexes over 100.

Judson Jones contributed reporting.

More than 99 million Americans are under extreme heat advisories, warnings or watches, according to heat.gov , the National Integrated Heat Health Information System. Overall, about 30 percent of the U.S. population is under one of the notices. Some of the highest-risk areas are in New England, upstate New York, Indiana and Ohio.

Austyn Gaffney

It is certain that 2024 will be among the five warmest years on record, and there is a 50-50 chance of it being the warmest ever on record, according to Karin Gleason of the National Centers for Environmental Information at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Heat index forecast for Thursday

Source: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration • The New York Times

How to sleep better in the heat.

A heat wave has scorched the Northeast, South, and Midwest this week, and those dangerously high temperatures can make it hard to sleep.

Studies show that extreme heat can affect both how much you sleep and how good that sleep is, said Chad Milando, a research scientist at the Center for Climate and Health at the Boston University School of Public Health. He and other experts said the people who are most vulnerable to poor sleep during a heat wave are low-income families who don’t have air-conditioning in their homes, as well as older adults or people with underlying health conditions that make them more susceptible to heat-related illness .

That’s why when temperatures rise, it’s essential to have a plan to keep cool when you sleep.

How Heat Affects Sleep

The body’s core temperature naturally drops during sleep, but hot environments can prevent the body from properly cooling. Studies also suggest that lower ambient temperatures signal to your body that it’s time to rest.

If the temperature in your bedroom is too high, it may be difficult to fall asleep , and you may wake up more frequently throughout the night, said Dr. Michael Irwin, a professor of psychiatry and biobehavioral sciences at the University of California, Los Angeles. You may also get less restorative sleep, he added.

To help your body regulate its temperature, your bedroom should ideally be between 65 and 68 degrees Fahrenheit, said Rebecca Robbins, an assistant professor of medicine in the sleep medicine division at Harvard Medical School. If your room is far hotter, you may wake up throughout the night, particularly during the stages of sleep when it’s not possible for the body to regulate its own temperature, she said.

“When exposed to extremes, we’re likely to wake ourselves up in order to shiver or wake ourselves up in order to sweat,” Dr. Robbins said.

Set Yourself Up for a Good Night’s Rest

There are steps you can take to sleep better during a heat wave, beyond just turning on air-conditioning, experts said.

“Sleeping well at night starts with staying hydrated and cool during the day,” Dr. Milando said. Drinking plenty of water when it is hot outside ensures that your body has enough fluid to cool down. When you’re dehydrated, you sweat less, and it becomes easier to overheat.

You can also keep your home cooler by closing your blinds or curtains to filter out direct sunlight, experts said. Keeping air circulating in your bedroom can also help. If you don’t have an air-conditioner, install a fan in an open window, which will help bring in the cooler air from outside, Dr. Robbins said.

To lower your body temperature before bed, place a damp rag on your forehead, Dr. Irwin said. “The moisture in that rag is going to evaporate across the night,” he said. But avoid ice packs, experts said, since placing them on your skin for too long can damage skin or cause frostbite .

Dr. Robbins recommended sleeping under a thin top sheet, which can promote airflow and make it easier to stick out your limbs out from under the sheet when you feel too warm. Pajamas should also be thin and loose to avoid trapping in heat. But when it’s extremely hot, “it might be a good time to try your birthday suit,” Dr. Robbins said.

If you are struggling to sleep peacefully during a heat wave, resist the urge to toss and turn in bed — it’ll only make you hotter, Dr. Robbins said.

“Try not to kick yourself for being awake, which we can all do,” she said. “Maybe get up, use the bathroom, try to keep the lights low, and then come back to your bedroom when you’re tired and get into bed when you are ready to sleep.”

Hilary Howard

All official training sessions for the New York City Marathon have been canceled today because of high heat, humidity, and air quality concerns, according to a statement issued by the New York Road Runners, the organizer of the race.

Kevin Williams

In rural Indiana, residents adjust their schedules and keep an eye on their neighbors.

Heat hits rural small towns differently than cities. In downtowns and sprawling suburbs, many people go about their business and don’t know one another. In Union County, Ind., which has about 7,000 residents and borders Ohio, everyone knows one another, said the county sheriff, Jeff Adams.

“That can be a double-edged sword, but during this heat, it’s helpful,” he said.

Sheriff Adams said that he knows most of the older residents in the county and can keep an eye on them. “I can tell if they have picked up their mail or whether their curtains are open,” he said. Between him and his eight deputies, he added, there isn’t anybody in the county who isn’t known by the sheriff’s department.

So far, he said, there haven’t been issues with older people affected by the heat. But the weather does present challenges for his law enforcement team.

Wearing dark uniforms in the sun takes its toll, he said. “And when you are wearing a bulletproof vest, it can cook you.”

In a concession to the heat, Sheriff Adams allows his deputies to wear shorts on these very hot days.

“But I still won’t wear them,” he said.

Sheriff Adams said that small Indiana towns like his were used to the heat and had learned to adapt. “You learn to adjust your schedule to the heat,” he said.

In Liberty, the county seat, the street department has started work this week at 5 a.m. instead of its regular 7 a.m. start time, and employees clock out by 2 p.m. The county highway department has moved shifts earlier too, coming in at 6 a.m.

And life in Liberty goes on. Gary and Austin Barrett, a father and son, were power-washing Liberty’s stately 19th-century courthouse with its towering limestone spires. Austin Barrett estimated that it would take 10,000 gallons of water to get the 130-foot-tall structure’s exterior back into pristine shape.

And across the street at Kehila Coffee, the owner, Dara Finch, wasn’t selling as much hot coffee.

“I’m selling a lot of iced lattes, and people are buying two drinks,” she said. “One for now, and one for later.”

The National Weather Service has issued a severe thunderstorm watch for parts of Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York and Vermont. The watch includes the eastern portions of New Hampshire and Maine that were forecast to have dangerous heat index values of 103 degrees or higher on Thursday. The watch is in effect until 8 p.m. and warns of the potential for scattered gusts of up to 70 miles per hour, hail the size of quarters and frequent lightning.

A severe thunderstorm watch has been issued for parts of Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York and Vermont until 8 PM EDT pic.twitter.com/AnNX4Em8bt — NWS Gray (@NWSGray) June 20, 2024

Heat isn’t the only weather news today: Wildfires in New Mexico have killed two people and burned 500 homes; flash floods in the same area prompted thousands to evacuate; and what remains of Tropical Storm Alberto, now a tropical depression , has caused floods in Mexico and Texas.

Robert Chiarito

Chicago’s Lincoln Square was filled with outdoor diners and others who wanted to enjoy a break from the heat.

Jim Stier, a 65-year-old retired urban forester who was sitting outside at a cafe reading a book, said he avoided going outside during the afternoon over the last few days.

“Right now it’s perfect but I heard it’s going to get hot again tomorrow for a few more days,” Stier said.

The heat wave has set records in Boston, Chicago and other cities.

As the Northeast and Midwest swelter in this week’s early-season heat wave, a number of longstanding daily records for high temperatures have fallen.

A high of 98 degrees was recorded in Boston on Wednesday, topping a record of 96 degrees set in 1923 for the same day of the year, according to the National Weather Service. Wednesday was Boston’s sixth-hottest June day on record.

A high of 97 degrees in Hartford, Conn., on Wednesday likewise set a daily local record, exceeding the previous high from 1995, the Weather Service reported.

Overall, 20 daily high-temperature records were tied or broken at National Weather Service observation sites on Tuesday and Wednesday, the agency said.

The temperature hit a reported 97 degrees at Chicago O’Hare International Airport on Monday, eclipsing a previous record of 96 degrees for that day.

Communities at higher altitudes have not been spared.

The small, leafy city of Elkins, W.Va., in the Appalachian Mountains, set record highs on Tuesday and Wednesday, with the temperature reaching 90 degrees on Wednesday, the Weather Service said. The previous record for the date in Elkins was 89 degrees.

Jerry Marco, the mayor of Elkins, said the weather was “very, very unusual” in the city of some 7,000.

“People are coming together to make sure that their neighbors are taken care of,” Mr. Marco said.

Many other cities and towns have tied or approached records.

Locales that have matched records include Wheeling, W.Va., where it was 95 degrees on Tuesday; Albany, N.Y., where the temperature hit 94 degrees on Wednesday; and Caribou, Maine, which experienced 96-degree heat on Wednesday, according to the Weather Service.

In Caribou, in the northeast corner of Maine, near the U.S. border with Canada, the heat index was reported at 103 degrees on Wednesday, an unofficial record. The heat index is a measure of how the air feels when accounting for humidity.

More records may yet fall. The peak of the heat wave is forecast to arrive in New England on Thursday, and the worst of the weather may not reach the Mid-Atlantic until the weekend. The temperature in Philadelphia is forecast to flirt with triple digits on Saturday and Sunday.

The Weather Service projected a high for Philadelphia on Sunday of 99 degrees, which, if reached, would break a record for the date of 97 degrees set in 1888.

Some school districts near New York City ended their day early on Thursday because of the heat. Districts that dismissed early included Yonkers and Pelham, just north of the city. “Please understand that this is not a decision that was made lightly,” the Pelham Public Schools superintendent, Cheryl Champ, said in a message .

Alyce McFadden

Most New York City pools are still closed as temperatures soar.

Outdoor public pools in New York City won’t open until June 27, leaving residents with fewer options to find refuge from this week’s heat wave.

The city’s 53 public outdoor pools are popular destinations in the summer. The pools, which are dotted across all five boroughs and are free to use, were visited more than one million times in 2022, according to city data . But this week, with temperatures climbing into the 90s, New Yorkers will have to seek out other destinations to cool off.

Mayor Eric Adams announced on Tuesday that the city would devote $1 billion to improving the city’s network of public pools over the next five years, though the new funding won’t help sweltering residents this year. Eventually, it will cover the costs of building two new indoor pools and renovating existing facilities.

“New York City’s pools and beaches are incredible places for New Yorkers to come together, learn to swim and beat the heat — and as climate change makes heat waves like this week’s more common and more severe, the need for pools has never been greater,” Mr. Adams said in a statement on Tuesday.

Like cities across the country, New York also faces an ongoing lifeguard shortage . Last year, pools opened when the city had around half the 1,000 lifeguards it usually has on hand, prompting parks officials to close sections of some pools . Now, the city says it is in better shape after it agreed to raise lifeguard wages for the second time in two years, this time to $22 per hour. The city will also offer a $1,000 retention bonus to lifeguards who worked last year and who agree to remain on duty through this year’s peak season.

Indoor swimming pools are open year-round, though there are far fewer of them in the city and most New Yorkers must pay an annual membership fee to use them. Adults 65 and older qualify for a discounted rate, and people 24 and younger can swim for free.

With pools closed this week, families sought out fountains and shade in parks. Gov. Kathy Hochul said admission and parking at New York State Parks would be free on Wednesday and Thursday.

Though it might feel as if summer is already in full swing, New York’s outdoor pools aren’t opening any later than they have in recent years. They opened on June 29 last year, and June 28 in 2022.

The increased funding announced Tuesday isn’t set to change when pools open, but Councilman Shekar Krishnan proposed legislation this year that would both open the pools earlier in the year and keep them open longer each day.

“On the most sweltering days in New York City, like what we’re experiencing this week, New Yorkers escape to our public pools and beaches to cool off,” Mr. Krishnan, whose district is in Queens, said in a statement. “But pools are useless, and beaches are dangerous, if they are closed and unstaffed.”

Currently, outdoor pools are set to open from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. every day, with an hour for cleaning starting at 3 p.m. Mr. Krishnan’s proposal would require that they open at 8 a.m. and close at 8 p.m.

Camille Baker contributed reporting.

Judson Jones

The heat isn’t the only weather risk in the Northeast today. Numerous thunderstorms that could produce damaging winds are expected across Upstate New York and New England this afternoon.

Phoenix is sizzling today, too. But here is why cities in the Northeast may be more worrisome.

The hottest place in the country right now? It’s Phoenix, with temperatures forecast to climb to 112 degrees as the day wears on.

But it may not feel like it: Thanks to the dry conditions, the city’s heat index — a measure that combines temperature and humidity to approximate how hot it feels — is forecast to be a few degrees lower, at 109 degrees. While that figure is still high, it isn’t far off from those expected in parts of the country accustomed to much milder weather: Manchester, N.H., for example, is forecast to have a heat index of 105 on Thursday.

Hot and dry temperatures are par for the course in Phoenix, which has weathered heat in the triple digits for much of June. That may help explain why Phoenix is rated a Level 3 for today (on a scale of 0 to 4) in terms of the health risk to the population, according to the HeatRisk tool by the National Weather Service and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which takes into account how unusual the heat is for the time of year, as people become acclimated to higher temperatures during the warmer months.

High HeatRisk conditions are associated with spikes in emergency room visits and heat-related emergency calls in Phoenix, according to the National Weather Service. Phoenix and the surrounding south-central region of Arizona are also under an excessive heat warning.

Large swaths of New York state and parts of Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont are rated a Level 4 on the HeatRisk scale, indicating that there is an extreme risk for the entire population from a rare level of heat.

Phoenix had a record 31-day streak of high temperatures at or above 110 degrees in 2023. For the year, Maricopa County identified a total of 340 heat-related deaths in Phoenix.

Sydney Cromwell

High temperatures in Maine are stressing the state’s infrastructure and essential services.

Maine was experiencing extremely warm conditions on Thursday, with temperatures expected in the 90s across much of the state for yet another day.

In some areas, like Portland and Bangor, the temperatures could approach or tie daily records.

Versant Power, one of the major power providers in Maine, reported higher system loads than usual on Wednesday but no heat-related outages, according to Marissa Minor, a communications supervisor for the company.

“Of course, everyone was running their air-conditioning and other devices,” she said. Versant expected a higher load on Thursday, too, she added.

Storms brought tree branches down on power lines on Wednesday evening, leaving around 7,000 customers without power in Penobscot and Piscataquis counties, Ms. Minor said. Power was beginning to be restored for many of those customers as of Thursday morning.

Versant crews responded only to power outages yesterday and will be doing the same today, Ms. Minor said, and regular construction and maintenance work will resume only after temperatures decrease. The company expects to have all power restored today, she said, but customers without power should seek cooling centers in the meantime.

“They want to get everyone’s power back on, but they want to do it safely,” Ms. Minor said.

About a dozen crews from the Maine Department of Transportation will be back at work on the roads on Thursday, after taking off for the Juneteenth holiday. Troy Leonard, an operations manager at the department, said the crews would be following standard heat precautions as they worked, taking plenty of breaks and staying hydrated.

Crews will have teams of four road flaggers monitoring traffic control instead of the usual two, so they can rotate in 20- to 30-minute shifts and rest in air-conditioned vehicles, Mr. Leonard said.

In Waterville, Maine, Everett Flannery, a deputy chief at the fire department, has been spreading the word about the city’s cooling center, especially among homeless people. Since Waterville began enforcing a no-camping ordinance in April to break up a homeless encampment in a park, the city’s unhoused population has spread out and become harder to reach with information, he said.

One homeless woman spent most of Wednesday in Waterville’s cooling center, and Mr. Flannery said the fire department had set her up with a doctor.

“It was a pretty good win for us,” he said.

The National Weather Service branch in Wilmington, Ohio, has extended a heat advisory for southwestern Ohio, which includes Cincinnati, through 8 p.m. Saturday. That would be the sixth consecutive day of extreme heat conditions.

Searing conditions will persist along the Northeast coast Thursday, with temperatures peaking in the 90s. In some locations, the heat index readings will reach 100 to 105, especially inland. The expected afternoon high temperatures and warm overnight lows could top daily records and even hit monthly and all-time marks.

Roni Caryn Rabin

Pregnant women are particularly vulnerable to the heat, doctors warn.

The heat wave sweeping through the United States poses a particular threat to pregnant women, especially those in their third trimester, doctors are warning.

“Heat is an underappreciated risk for the health of the pregnancy,” said Dr. Nathaniel DeNicola, an environmental health expert at the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

“Of all the associations that we hear about connecting environmental factors like what you eat or what you drink to risks, this one has quite a bit of science behind it,” he said.

Pregnant women should remain indoors in a cool environment, if possible, get enough rest and avoid going outside during the hottest times of day, he and other experts said. Since dehydration can lead to preterm contractions and premature birth, pregnant women should drink plenty of fluids. Cool showers may also help.

The risks are well documented, Dr. DeNicola said. Fatigue and dehydration can lead to a cascade of prostaglandins, hormone-like compounds produced by the body, that in turn cause Braxton-Hicks contractions — preterm contractions that normally do not lead to delivery.

Extreme heat has also been associated with a higher risk of having a low-birth-weight baby , as well as increasing the chances of stillbirth .

Women in their third trimester are at greatest risk of early labor, but pregnant women at any gestational stage should be sure to maintain “tons of hydration,” Dr. DeNicola said.

“You almost can’t drink too much water,” he said. “If you find yourself getting thirsty, you’re already way behind.”

Other signs of heat exhaustion, which may precede heat stroke, are dizziness, nausea, weakness and excessive sweating, which may signal that the body is struggling to cool itself.

Typically pregnant women who go to the emergency room suffering from heat exhaustion will be told to rest and given fluids, orally or through an IV, which can reverse the condition and forestall early labor, Dr. DeNicola said.

Casey Patrick

In Indianapolis, 15 cooling centers operated by the city's parks and recreation department will be open today, as the city prepares for a high of 93 degrees and mostly sunny skies.

Chicagoans awoke to cooler temperatures on Thursday morning. The high in downtown Chicago was expected to near 78, according to the National Weather Service. That is almost 20 degrees cooler than earlier this week. There was a slight chance of thunderstorms in the afternoon.

It’ll be warmer farther from Lake Michigan, forecasters said. Today’s predicted high at O’Hare International Airport, about 12 miles inland, is 89 degrees.

Air quality alerts have been issued for New York and the surrounding metro area, as these warmer days can amplify the chemical reactions that cause smog.

Forecasts show that the swelter will continue in the East on Thursday, but that temperatures in upstate New York and New England will begin to temper. By Friday, higher heat indexes will be contained to the Midwest through the mid-Atlantic. Afternoon high temperatures and warm overnight lows will continue to challenge daily records and even some monthly and all-time records heading into the weekend.

Climate change made heat wave in Mexico and Southwest U.S. last month 35 times more likely.

The deadly heat waves that began across Central America last month and moved up into Mexico and the Southwestern United States were made 35 times more likely by human-caused climate change, according to a new report by World Weather Attribution, an international organization of climate scientists.

Globally, heat waves are becoming more frequent, longer and hotter as levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere rise from the burning of fossil fuels for energy. This week, wide swaths of the United States have been experiencing record-breaking heat and dozens of people around the world have died amid intense heat during this year’s hajj pilgrimage .

“The results of our study should be taken as another warning that our climate is heating to dangerous levels,” Izidine Pinto, a researcher at the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute who worked on the analysis, said in a statement.

The scientists examined temperature data from five days of the hottest daytime and nighttime temperatures between late May and early June and compared recorded temperatures with a hypothetical planet in which humans had never pumped any greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

The extreme heat the scientists studied was caused by a heat dome, where clear, sunny skies radiated the hot air trapped near the ground by a high-pressure weather system. The excessive temperatures were exacerbated by feedback loops caused by an ongoing drought, particularly in Mexico, and warmer ocean temperatures in the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean.

“This essentially is the same dome of high pressure that started over Central America, ballooned to the Southwest, and now is over the Eastern side of the U.S.,” said Shel Winkley, a meteorologist and weather and climate engagement specialist with Climate Central, a climate communications nonprofit.

This level of heat used to be a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence back in 2000, but with the amount of warming that has happened since then, the average person could experience such an event five or six times in their life.

Heat across the region included in the report caused wildfires, power outages and a mass die-off of endangered monkeys . Dangerous temperatures in Mexico have caused at least 125 deaths since March, according to the study, along with more than 2,300 cases of heat stroke.

The report was released after Mexico recorded its hottest day ever, when temperatures peaked at 125 degrees Fahrenheit in the Sonoran Desert. Temperature records were also broken in Guatemala and Honduras, along with Mexico City, Las Vegas, Phoenix and Death Valley in California.

“Heat deaths are often underestimated,” said Karina Izquierdo, the urban adviser for Latin America and the Caribbean from the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Center and a contributor to the report.

Heat-related deaths tend to be confirmed months after the heat event, if they are reported at all. Yet, heat is the No. 1 weather-related killer , and dozens of environmental and labor groups are pushing the Federal Emergency Management Agency to declare heat a major disaster.

Some of the groups at greatest risk include agricultural laborers, construction workers and street vendors who face direct exposure, Ms. Izquierdo said, along with unhoused people, pregnant people, young children and older adults.

She said, “Refugees and migrants in transit are particularly vulnerable due to the long and physically demanding journey,” which includes exposure to high temperatures. Between May 31 and June 10, eight bodies of possible migrants were found in the borderlands of southern New Mexico and West Texas, while the region was experiencing excessive heat.

Nadja Popovich and Adam Pearce

You’re not imagining it. Summers are getting hotter.

Extremely hot summers, the kind that were virtually unheard of decades ago, have become increasingly common.

The graphic above, based on an analysis from researchers at Columbia University, shows how, in recent decades, local summer temperatures across the Northern Hemisphere have shifted conspicuously toward higher heat.

Not every summer is hotter today; some areas still see average or colder than average seasons from June through August. But the distribution of summer temperatures has shifted so that many more places endure hot summers more often than they did in the past. And the most drastic change has occurred at the hottest extreme.

Less than 1 percent of summers in the middle of the 20th century were extremely hot for their location, according to the analysis, compared with more than a quarter of summers over the last decade.

This summer is again expected to be hotter than average across much of the United States, and in other parts of the world , too.

Globally, each of the past 12 months has been the warmest on record for that month. And 2023 was the hottest year since modern record-keeping began in the mid-1800s.

“Extreme heat is one of the most direct ways in which we are experiencing the impacts of global warming,” said Deepti Singh, who leads the Climate Extremes Lab at Washington State University.

And it’s also one of the clearest signals of how the burning of fossil fuels and other human activities are changing the planet’s climate, she added.

Dana G. Smith

Here’s how heat affects the brain.

In July 2016, a heat wave hit Boston, with daytime temperatures averaging 92 degrees for five days in a row. Some local university students who were staying in town for the summer got lucky and were living in dorms with central air-conditioning. Other students, not so much — they were stuck in older dorms without A.C.

Jose Guillermo Cedeño Laurent, a Harvard researcher at the time, decided to take advantage of this natural experiment to see how heat, and especially heat at night, affected the young adults’ cognitive performance . He had 44 students perform math and self-control tests five days before the temperature rose, every day during the heat wave, and two days after.

“Many of us think that we are immune to heat,” said Dr. Cedeño, now an assistant professor of environmental and occupational health and justice at Rutgers University. “So something that I wanted to test was whether that was really true.”

It turns out even young, healthy college students are affected by high temperatures. During the hottest days, the students in the un-air-conditioned dorms, where nighttime temperatures averaged 79 degrees, performed significantly worse on the tests they took every morning than the students with A.C., whose rooms stayed a pleasant 71 degrees.

A heat wave is once again blanketing the Northeast, South and Midwest . High temperatures can have an alarming effect on our bodies , raising the risk for heart attacks, heatstroke and death, particularly among older adults and people with chronic diseases . But heat also takes a toll on our brains, impairing cognition and making us irritable, impulsive and aggressive.

How heat hurts our cognition

Numerous studies in lab settings have produced similar results to Dr. Cedeño’s research, with scores on cognitive tests falling as scientists raised the temperature in the room. One investigation found that just a four-degree increase — which participants described as still feeling comfortable — led to a 10 percent average drop in performance across tests of memory, reaction time and executive functioning.

This can have real consequences. R. Jisung Park, an environmental and labor economist at the University of Pennsylvania, looked at high school standardized test scores and found that they fell 0.2 percent for every degree above 72 Fahrenheit. That might not sound like a lot, but it can add up for students taking an exam in an un-air-conditioned room during a 90-degree heat wave.

In another study , Dr. Park found that the more hotter-than-average days there were during the school year, the worse students did on a standardized test — especially when the thermometer climbed above 80 degrees. He thinks that may be because greater exposure to heat was affecting students’ learning throughout the year.

The effect was “more pronounced for lower income and racial minority students,” Dr. Park said, possibly because they were less likely to have air-conditioning, both at school and at home.

Why heat makes us aggressive

Researchers first discovered the link between heat and aggression by looking at crime data , finding that there are more murders, assaults and episodes of domestic violence on hot days. The connection applies to nonviolent acts, too: When temperatures rise, people are more likely to engage in hate speech online and honk their horns in traffic .

Lab studies back this up. In one 2019 experiment , people acted more spitefully toward others while playing a specially designed video game in a hot room than in a cool one.

So-called reactive aggression tends to be especially sensitive to heat, most likely because people tend to interpret others’ actions as more hostile on hot days, prompting them to respond in kind.

Kimberly Meidenbauer, an assistant professor of psychology at Washington State University, thinks this increase in reactive aggression may be related to heat’s effect on cognition, particularly the dip in self control . “Your tendency to act without thinking, or not be able to stop yourself from acting a certain way, these things also appear to be affected by heat,” she said.

What’s happening in the brain

Researchers don’t know why heat affects our cognition and emotions, but there are a couple of theories.

One is that the brain’s resources are being diverted to keep you cool, leaving less energy for everything else. “If you’re allocating all of the blood and all the glucose to parts of your brain that are focused on thermoregulation, it seems like it’s very plausible that you just wouldn’t have enough left for some of these kind of higher cognitive functions,” Dr. Meidenbauer said.

You could also be distracted and irritable because of how hot and miserable you feel. It turns out that’s actually one of the brain’s coping responses. If you can’t get cool, your brain will “make you feel even more uncomfortable so that finding the thing you need to survive will become all consuming,” explained Shaun Morrison, a professor of neurological surgery at Oregon Health and Science University.

Heat’s effect on sleep could play a role, too. In the Boston study, the hotter it got, the more students’ sleep was disrupted — and the worse they performed on the tests.

The best way to offset these effects is to cool yourself off , as soon as possible. If you don’t have access to air-conditioning, fans can help, and be sure to stay hydrated. It might sound obvious, but what matters most for your brain, mood and cognition is how hot your body is, not the temperature outside.

IMAGES

Tenth-largest yacht in world docks in Portland
David Geffen's 82-Room Megayacht Docks in Portland, Maine
Photos: David Geffen's "superyacht" docks in Portland Harbor
Photos: David Geffen's "superyacht" docks in Portland Harbor
David Geffen's mega-yacht
Billionaire David Geffen’s yacht drops anchor off Bar Harbor

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To entertainment mogul David Geffen, the 82-room, $400 million gigayacht floating in the Portland harbor is merely a part-time home. A boat that is worth $381 million more than the most expensive ...
Media mogul David Geffen's massive yacht turns heads in Portland
And this week, David Geffen's massive yacht "Rising Sun" made its way to Maine, where the $400 million vessel has been turning heads and drawing curious onlookers. The 82-room yacht docked ...
One of the world's biggest yachts is in Maine
PORTLAND, Maine — Love it or hate it, there was a massive yacht owned by a multibillionaire in Portland Harbor on Wednesday in what's the city's peak tourism season. The Rising Sun, a 450-foot gigayacht owned by billionaire David Geffen, is the 20th largest yacht in the world, according to the Robb Report.
Gigayacht spotted in Portland Harbor attracts attention
PORTLAND (WGME) -- A $400 million gigayacht floating in the Portland Harbor is turning heads. According to the Press Herald, a yacht is typically at least 30 feet long, a superyacht is 80-100 feet ...
Massive yacht turns heads along Maine waterfront
The "Rising Sun" is owned by billionaire media mogul David Geffen. The so-called giga-yacht is one of the 20 largest yachts in the world. It is 452 feet long, and five stories high with 82 rooms ...
Lavish and looming, gigayacht bobbing in Portland harbor attracts
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • August 22, 2023 Rising Sun, a five-story, 82-room, $381 million gigayacht owned by billionaire David Geffen, was docked in Portland on Monday. Geffen is No. 229 on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index with a net worth of $9.14 billion. Rising Sun has a gym, a wine cellar, a spa,
Gigayacht arrives in Portland Harbor
A $400 million gigayacht floating in the Portland Harbor is turning heads. A yacht is typically at least 30 feet long, a superyacht is 80 to 100 feet long, a megayacht is 200 feet and a gigayacht ...
6th Biggest Yacht in the World Spotted in Harpswell, Maine
This yacht belongs to David Geffen, the founder of Geffen Records and co-founder of DreamWorks. Kelly Green-Chartier spotted the luxury yacht off the coast of Harpswell this past weekend. This little boat, according to the website Super Yacht Fan, has some impressive numbers.
David Geffen's 82-Room Megayacht Docks in Portland, Maine
Thus when the world's 10th largest yacht, David Geffen's 453-foot. The picturesque harbor at Portland, Maine hosts a number of luxury cruise ships in the fall months, but rarely does a ...
David Geffen's 82-Room Megayacht Docks in Portland, Maine
The picturesque harbor at Portland, Maine hosts a number of luxury cruise ships in the fall months, but rarely does a privately owned vessel of a similar stature grace its waters. Thus when the world's 10th largest yacht, David Geffen's 453-foot long Rising Sun docked there recently, it caused quite a sensation.The five-story, 82-room yacht took up enough space for several smaller boats at the ...
Photos: David Geffen's "superyacht" docks in Portland Harbor
One of the largest yacht's in the world, owned by David Geffen, was docked in Portland Harbor on Tuesday. PHOTO: WMTW Image Geffen is a former record producer and founder of Dreamworks.
Tenth-largest yacht in world docks in Portland
PORTLAND — The 10th-largest yacht in the world is berthed in Portland this week. The Rising Sun, a five-story, 82-room super yacht owned by billionaire David Geffen, arrived Tuesday morning at ...
One of the world's biggest yachts is in Portland Harbor
The "gigayacht" is owned by multibillionaire David Geffen, who produced music for legends like Bob Dylan, The Eagles and Dreamworks movies like "Shrek." ... Navigation. News. Back; Local; Crime; Health; 207; Education; Maine Politics; Politics; Nation World; Entertainment; Political Brew; Maine Things To Do ... Two people indicted in connection ...
David Geffens $200 million dollar yacht
10th largest yacht in the world 450ft 82 rooms 40 crew members, stopped in portland maine.
Rising Sun yacht: Luxurious world of Larry Ellison and David Geffen ⋆
However, Ellison later sold a significant portion of the yacht to music and film producer David Geffen. Today it is co-owned by Larry Ellison and David Geffen. Size. Rising Sun is approximately 454 feet (138 meters) in length, making it one of the largest yachts in the world at the time. Its impressive size allows for a wide range of amenities ...
The yachting crowd was gearing up for a booming 2020 sailing season
David Geffen's yacht Rising Sun at dock in Portland, Maine, in 2013. Gregory Rec / Portland Press Herald/Getty Images file Within a week he had built a crew solicited from an online sailing forum ...
RISING SUN Yacht • David Geffen $400M Superyacht
The Rising Sun Yacht, initially built for Larry Ellison, is now owned by David Geffen. Built by Lürssen and designed by Jon Bannenberg, this 138-meter yacht is among the largest in the world. It features luxurious amenities like a movie theater, spa, wine cellar, and helicopter landing pad. The yacht can accommodate up to 16 guests, has a crew ...
Tenth-largest yacht in world docks in Portland
The Rising Sun, owned by billionaire David Geffen, has 82 rooms and cost more than $200 million to build.
David Geffen Is Self-Isolating on His Yacht, Rising Sun: Photos
Billionaire David Geffen is in the hot seat for a "tone-deaf" Instagram post about isolating on his yacht, Rising Sun, in the Caribbean, The Guardian reported. Geffen reportedly paid $590 million ...
Rising Sun : r/portlandme
Did anyone see this yacht today? Owned by David Geffen - I thought it was a cruise ship! ... Portland (Maine) Cumberland County Maine United States of America North America Place comments sorted by Best Top New Controversial Q&A Add a Comment. DanceswithWolves54 • Additional comment actions ...
David Geffen and his megayacht Rising Sun are still at large
David Geffen and his $590 million megayacht Rising Sun were seen this week off the Maine coast. The $590 million yacht was seen this week off the Maine coast. Primary Menu Sections
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96K subscribers in the Maine community. A place to discuss all things Maine related. Maine, the way life should be. ... This is the largest yacht I've seen in the Portland area. Is Jeff Bezos coming or something?? 😆👀😨📍Cape Elizabeth. ... but David Geffen. Apparently this thing has 82 rooms, including a basketball court.
Inside The Rising Sun: David Geffen's $590 Million Superyacht
Geffen bought half of the share of the 454-foot megayacht in 2007 and decided to buy the yacht in full in 2010 which totaled his payment for $590 million. The exact estimated value of the yacht is still unclear but as of 2019, the yacht was valued for $300 million. After Geffen bought it, he had the yacht refitted in the period of just six months.
Poisoned trees gave a wealthy couple in Maine a killer ocean view ...
Follow David Sharp on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, @David_Sharp_AP The homes of Lisa Gorman, front, and Amelia and Arthur Bond are seen, Tuesday, June 4, 2024, in Camden, Maine.
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Rising Sun yacht: The luxurious world of Larry Ellison and David Geffen’s nautical retreat

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Hollywood billionaire David Geffen has been self-isolating on his superyacht in the Caribbean during the coronavirus pandemic. Take a look at the $590 million yacht.

The entertainment mogul David Geffen, founder of DreamWorks, SKG, Asylum Records, Geffen Records, and DGS Records, owns Rising Sun. According to Forbes, he's worth an estimated $7.8 billion.

The 454-foot megayacht was originally built for Oracle founder Larry Ellison. Geffen bought a half-share in 2007 and the other half in 2010, totaling $590 million.

The exact value of the superyacht is unclear. However, a 2019 put its value at $300 million.

Rising Sun was constructed by the German shipbuilder Lurssen. Once Geffen became owner, he had the yacht refitted over a six-month period.

The yacht can accommodate 18 guests and a staff of 55 people. It even has a basketball court.

The top deck is dedicated entirely to the owner and includes a double-height cinema.

Geffen has cruised everywhere from St. Bart's and the Tobago Cays in the Caribbean to Portofino, Italy, and Ibiza, Spain, according to posts Business Insider previously viewed on his now-deactivated Instagram — but not without a few friends.

Rising Sun is a great place for entertaining. A scroll through Geffen's Instagram feed before it was deleted showed that he's hosted many a celebrity guest on board.

Oprah Winfrey, Bradley Cooper, Orlando Bloom, Katy Perry, Chris Rock, Bruce Springsteen, Mariah Carey, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Tom Hanks have all joined Geffen in cruising the high seas, according to now-deleted Instagram posts.

But Geffen doesn't just invite actors and musicians on board. In 2017, Barack and Michelle Obama were spotted on board while the yacht was in French Polynesia.

And in summer 2019, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, investment banker Lloyd Blankfein, and supermodel Karlie Kloss were spotted aboard in the Balearics in Spain.

But Geffen likely won't have any friends on board anytime soon during the coronavirus pandemic.

On Saturday, he posted a photo to his Instagram from Rising Sun. The caption read: "Sunset last night. Isolated in the Grenadines avoiding the virus. I hope everybody is staying safe."

Twitter lit up with backlash, with people calling his post "shameful" and out of touch. Geffen then deleted his Instagram.

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Inside The Rising Sun: David Geffen's $590 Million Superyacht