KORSOER, Denmark (AP) -- The world's largest cruise ship has cleared a crucial obstacle, lowering its smokestacks to squeeze under a bridge in Denmark.

The Oasis of the Seas -- which rises about 20 stories high -- passed below the Great Belt Fixed Link with a slim margin as it left the Baltic Sea on Saturday on its maiden voyage to Florida.

Bridge operators said that even after lowering its telescopic smokestacks the giant ship had less than a 2-foot (half-meter) gap.

Hundreds of people gathered on beaches at both ends of the bridge to watch the Oasis of the Seas sail by shortly after midnight (2300GMT; 7 p.m. EDT).

Five times larger than the Titanic, the ship has seven neighborhoods, an ice rink, a small golf course and a 750-seat outdoor amphitheater.

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