Viking longships plan perilous trip to new museum

OSLO (Reuters) - Viking longships ruled the seas 1,000 years ago and even crossed the Atlantic and now three of them may face a new perilous trip -- albeit just 6 km (4 miles) across Oslo.

Oslo University, which looks after them, wants to move the ancient wooden vessels from the Viking Ship Museum on the edge of the Norwegian capital to a new city-center museum for all Viking artifacts.

But Wednesday's vote for the move by the university board sparked disputes on Thursday about whether or not they were strong enough to survive or would splinter apart on the way.

"We shouldn't just look at the troubles ... we could make the best Viking ship museum in the world" by moving the ships, Egil Mikkelsen, director of the Viking Ship Museum, told Reuters.

A move would give more space for up to 500,000 visitors who crowd his small museum each year and allow the ships to be displayed with Viking jewels, weapons and other objects now held in a separate collection.

Others say the 9th-century vessels are too fragile for the move of about 6 km in a straight line that is not due until about 2015.

"No one can say for sure that the Viking ships will withstand the move," Grete Berget, a dissenting member of the board, told the NTB news agency.

The ships, including the ornate two-tonne 22 meter (72 ft 2.2 in) Oseberg ship excavated from a Viking queen's grave in 1904, might be put in giant containers filled with styrofoam and either driven by road or floated part of the way over a fjord.

The Oseberg ship was moved by rail and vessel in 1926 from the center of Oslo to the museum after restoration of pieces brought from the site where it was discovered in south Norway.

The Vikings -- remembered in Nordic nations as traders and adventurers but in many other nations as looters and pillagers -- traveled vast distances in their longships, and Leif Eriksson reached North America.

In the end, politicians are likely to have the final word about whether the ships will be on the move again.