chengkp75

No, you don't use shore power to "charge up" a ship, no more than the city of Southampton wants to provide shore power to "charge up" commercial ships in port. It is for in port power usage by the ship, so that the ship's generators are shut down while in port. In port pollution is the major complaint against cruise ships, not their total GHG emissions. However, many small ships that will use fuel cells, have battery banks to store the power generated by the fuel cell, and these could be charged during port operations. And, in port, even the largest cruise ship only uses 9-10Mw of power, not gigawatts. If cruise ship pollution is so important to you, surprised you haven't read up on shore power, considering that Southampton has installed shore power at the two cruise terminals, which have been used to allow ships to shut down their generators 42 times in 2022. And, yes, that power can charge the ship's batteries.

Who and why would Alaska be shut down? Alaska is far more likely to implement shore power for cruise ships than a total ban. And, who would shut the Caribbean down, given that the term "the Caribbean" encompasses many different nations? Would they all need to agree to ban cruise ships?

While the QM2 can generate more than the city of Southampton uses, it rarely does, as that would require sailing at full power of the four diesel generators 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. While the fuel cell technology will not handle a full ship's power requirement, the Viking ships will have a 6Mw fuel cell, that will handle the hotel load easily. And, they are sizing these applications up every year. I believe you are mistaking the Hurtigruten cruise/ferries with the Viking Ocean cruise ships. And, with 1500 m2 of solar panel area, that equates to 1Mw of power, enough for the hotel load on a ship this size (500 pax). And, the sails, if assuming the 1500 m2 of solar panel is on both sides of the sail, that means a sail area of 750 m2, which can produce 1.2Mw of propulsive power, even at a mild 5 knot wind, and since the relationship between wind speed and sail power is to the 4th power, a 10 knot breeze would produce nearly 5Mw of power. Do you really think the company would invest in these costly technologies if they didn't provide an actual benefit?

Further refining my numbers given above, cruise ships represent 2.6% of the world's shipping gross tonnage, and only 0.2% of the number of ships in the world.

Very possibly And, yet, you continue to cruise. Those regarding biofouling of the hull Once again, ace, you have your facts wrong. World wide TOTAL shipping (tankers, bulkers, container ships, ferries, cruise ships) amounts to 3% of total greenhouse gas production (so your number is wrong), and cruise ships account for less than 5% of total world shipping (so you are about an order of magnitude out). The rest of the global transportation system (buses, trucks, cars, trains, airplanes) account for 17% of GHG emissions, yet 80% of the world's economy moves by sea. And, finally, ships, including cruise ships are working to reduce GHG emissions, as witnessed by Viking Cruises working to install hydrogen fuel cells on all their newbuild ocean ships, and Royal Caribbean already having small scale hydrogen fuel cells on some of their ships. Not to say these projects have hurdles to overcome, and years of development for safety standards, but the change is coming. Might want to get out and read a bit before quoting figures.

And, again, I will say that the Star Princess fire was not proved to be from a cigarette. As the Pacific Adventure fire happened in May of this year, I would not expect a MAIB report for about a year. But "scuttlebutt" cannot even agree on the severity of the fire (one or more cabins) or where it was (bed in cabin, or balcony). For every reported fire blamed on a cigarette (and there are very few), I've seen others that are definitively caused by things like draping something over the bedside lamp. Yes, cigarette smoking can cause a fire, but given the fire retardant construction of even the upholstery on cruise ships, it becomes less of a threat than on land. And, while there have been several fires on cruise ships since the Star Princess, I cannot think of but one or two that happened in passenger cabins (the lamp incident I mention), nor any that were found to be by cigarette. If you know of any, please let me know.

How often do mooring lines break? Fairly often, maybe one or two per ship per year. How often does one or more lines break and cause interference with the gangway? Not often. One way that ships have remediated line breakage is through the use of "pendants". You may see these on cruise ship mooring lines, where the end of the line that goes over the bollard on the dock is only a couple of meters long, and is then shackled to the longer mooring line. The pendant is rated for a lower breaking strength than the mooring line, so the more expensive long mooring line doesn't break first. Another way is to have the winch brakes set for "rendering", or slipping when the load gets near the breaking strength of the rope. This saves the mooring line from breaking, but can cause the ship to move away from the dock, which can then interfere with the gangway.

And, as I said, it might have caused a fire, but the only conclusion drawn was that "in the absence of any definitive cause" it might have been a cigarette, since one was observed on a balcony on a previous day. And, yes, you are correct, no passenger should confront another passenger, and typically, a call about smoking would go to the security office for their intervention, not someone from hotel services.

I don't believe either would be ignored, but the response would be different, less intense response for the cigarette. I.e. the security officer might not have to rush and possibly fall and hurt himself responding to a cigarette smoke complaint. One is a 911 call, one is a "citizen's complaint". Both are the responsibility of law enforcement, and so both would be investigated. As someone has noted above, security does not need "probable cause" to enter a stateroom, you have given them that right, at any time and for any reason, with or without your knowledge or consent, when you agree to the ticket contract.

I think it is a far different scenario if you call guest services and say "I smell smoke" than if you say "I smell cigarette smoke". To me, JMHO, it would be like making a false 911 call. Cigarette smoke is a nuisance, but not necessarily a safety situation, while smoke on a ship should always be treated as such, and the Security Officer will respond differently to the two scenarios.

There is almost always a security response with a report to the bridge on status, before any firefighting response is called out. Calling out the approximately 50-60 crew members, who would have to don heavy equipment to respond to the call, for something you know is not an emergency is completely irresponsible for the one making the call.

From the DNV website, their bottom survey (dry dock) is due in Oct 2024, and since this is also their "main class renewal" period, that means they could not do this early in Jan. The range for the class renewal is July to October 2024, so any dry dock outside that range "doesn't count", and they would need to do another one during the required range. I believe that RCI "suspended" their class certificates during COVID, so the class renewal period slipped, and the Jan date may have been from pre-covid.

No, no definitive cause was found for that fire, so it was assumed to be caused by a cigarette, even though in laboratory conditions they were unable to re-enact a fire caused by a cigarette with the available contents on the balcony. I have fought fires on several ships, including cruise ships, so I am not a fan of smoking on the balconies (for various reasons), but always point this out when the Star Princess fire is brought up regarding cigarettes. Also, with the changes made subsequently to the Star Princess, a fire is even less likely.

Explorer 9/25 Jewel 4/24 Freedom 4/25 These are the statutory dates, there can be some slip a month or two either side of these dates.

The propellers shown in the photos are thruster modules. As for the azipods, I will tread carefully in contradicting Captain Kate here on the Celebrity board, but while there may be maintenance done inside the azipods monthly, they are inspected far more frequently.

Streaming at hotels is done via land line wired/fiber service, not satellite. And there is a vast difference between satellite internet to your home as opposed to a moving ship at sea. While I agree that internet has gone down in cost over the years, and even to a degree the same at sea, it is still very costly and technically difficult to provide a vast amount of bandwidth to a moving (and not just moving but rolling or pitching) antenna at sea. Even with the new constellations of satellites over the oceans, you still have limited bandwidth.

The most frequently failed item on a coffee maker, tea kettle, or steamer (anything with a water tank and heater) is the "auto-off" switch. Mr. Coffee almost went out of business a few decades ago because of lawsuits over fires caused by their defective auto-off switches. The kettles and coffee makers that cruise lines allow in cabins are taken out of service every six months for inspection and testing, which is a whole lot of man hours, which is why most lines restrict the numbers onboard. I remember one coffee maker on NCL that went up in flames while it was plugged in the electrician's shop for testing. As for microwaves, you can put non-microwavable glass products in the microwave, and have them explode, or metal of certain configurations can cause sparking and cause the magnetron to fail, possibly causing a fire. Also, how many times have people put food in a microwave, not knowing its wattage, and burned food (especially popcorn), which would then trigger the fire alarm, and cause the crew to respond to the alarm. As Andy says, it is risk analysis, done by the cruise lines' insurance clubs, that determine whether they allow kettles in all cabins or not. Lines that allow kettles in UK cruises likely have policies that carry a higher premium than those that don't. Hair care appliances are accepted by the insurance underwriters as acceptable simply because of the detriment to the cruise lines' business if they didn't allow them. As for a "true streaming TV", I would hate to see what the cruise fare would be to cover the bandwidth for a thousand TV's on satellite internet.

I don't know which ships specifically, but any Oasis or Quantum class ship built after 2015 will have some small scale (maybe up to a couple megawatts) fuel cells installed.

Yes, the volumetric energy densities I listed are for liquid fuel. Ammonia is liquified at -33*C, so is not so cyrogenic as LNG or hydrogen. But, liquid ammonia still requires twice the volume as liquid LNG, to provide the same energy output. As I've said, Viking is already building ships for hydrogen fuel use, and RCI has placed hydrogen fuel cells, of increasing size, on Oasis and Quantum class ships for about 8 years. But, supply is the biggest stumbling block.

Ammonia requires twice the volume of LNG, and hydrogen three times the volume of LNG, for the same energy output. Hydrogen carries its own problems with the cryogenics involved (-161*C for LNG, -259*C for hydrogen). And, Viking is building new ships to be eventually fully fueled by hydrogen (900 passenger range).

The US has claimed "extra-territorial" jurisdiction over certain crimes (assault, rape, murder, theft) against US citizens that happened on a foreign flag cruise ship while in international waters. So, it would be a federal crime, and investigated by the FBI, if it happened. I haven't read the whole thread, so I don't know if the "authorities" mentioned above were the FBI or local law enforcement. Any death of a US citizen on a ship would have law enforcement receiving the body at the port, whether it was criminal or natural death.

I still don't see any answers to the storage issues that class societies are, to the best of my knowledge, still grappling with. I don't follow Mr. Hagen's comments about a "short dry dock" to convert to hydrogen, unless they are installing the cryogenic tanks from new build, but the first ship to have the fuel cells will still need 3 diesel engines (since the fuel cell will only be 6Mw), and therefore they will need conventional tankage for distillate fuel as well.

The Skyway bridge has an air draft of 180.5 feet, the Key bridge in Baltimore is 185 feet, and the Bridge of the Americas in Panama is 201 feet, all at high tide. So, a ship could not fit under the Skyway or Key bridges, but still clear the Bridge of the Americas.

Let's look at this. The UN, has set the right to sanitation to be a universal human right. While both Panama and Bahamas are signatory to the convention, the US has not formally ratified the convention, with the thinking that sanitation is not a basic human right, but a socio-economic one. So, the major flag states for cruise ships are more forward thinking than the US, with regards to access to sanitation.

Which leads me to why I would disagree with a statement of the "health of the industry" without a mention of the unusually large debt load that the major lines are carrying. The need for "immediate" economic benefit is of course due to the need to make interest payments on their huge debt load. And yet while they cannot afford to invest in a long term benefit, they can invest vast sums in new tonnage, that will need the increased demand to fill, and pay off the capital cost. Ship owning, being a cyclical, and long lead time, industry in terms of building new tonnage, more conservative ordering, to keep demand high would also help with the bottom line.