The new probabilistic damaged stability regulations for dry cargo and passenger ships (SOLAS 2009), which entered into force on January 1, 2009, represent a major step forward in achieving an improved safety standard through the rationalization and harmonization of damaged stability requirements. There are, however, serious concerns regarding the adopted formulation for the calculation of the survival probability of passenger ships, particularly for ROPAX and large cruise vessels; thus eventually of the Attained and Required Subdivision Indices for passenger ships. Furthermore, present damaged stability regulations account only for collision damages, despite the fact that accidents statistics, particularly of passenger ships, indicate the profound importance of grounding accidents. The present paper outlines the objectives, the methodology of work and early results of the EU funded, FP7 project GOALDS (Goal Based Damaged Stability, 2009-2012), which aims at addressing the above shortcomings by state of the art scientific methods and formulating a rational regulatory framework, properly accounting for the for the damage stability properties of passenger ships.