chengkp75

Various marine engineers and naval architects, along with the class society signed off on the operation, or it wouldn't have been attempted.

That dock was about 40 years old, and they were knowingly exceeding the lifting capacity of the dock. In fact, they were lifting only about half the weight of Oasis and using cofferdams to access the azipods, since the dock was not dry, but still about 10-15 feet underwater.

The manifest is only submitted (documenting an actual voyage) less than an hour before the ship sails, so no manifest was submitted while those folks were onboard and then left. The manifest is used to clear the passengers out of the country.

The Navy has been trying to apply root cause analysis to incident investigation, but it has not taken hold the way that it has in civilian life. Some of this may be that the maritime industry is required to create and apply the ISM, which uses root cause analysis as it's main auditing tool.

Not sure why everyone is looking for an individual to "blame" for the incident. The maritime industry has moved on from the "blame" culture of incident investigation, and into the "root cause" culture. In this system, "blame" is not assigned to individuals, so that the investigators can more reliably get an accurate statement of facts from everyone involved, so that the "root cause" of the incident can be found. If the Captain followed all of the procedures and policies outlined for docking the vessel as stated in the company's ISM (International Safety Management) system, then he/she will not be held to "blame", but the policies and procedures will be amended to prevent a similar incident from happening again. This also applies to what the Captain/Pilot interaction was, and what the pilot was doing, with regards to Princess' ISM system. Similarly, the pilot's association will not blame the pilot if he/she followed all the procedures and policies in the association's ISM.

Why only those two schools? What about Maine Maritime, Mass Maritime, NY Maritime, Texas A&M, or Great Lakes Maritime? Are they lesser schools than the two you mention? Why did this happen? Could be act of God, meaning weather or environmental factors that changed during the maneuver, or the sort of incident caused by the "swiss cheese" effect, where a number of small errors that would normally not cause an incident, all happened at the same time to "make the holes line up" to lead to the incident. Root cause analysis will be used to determine the cause, and then the ISM will be amended to try to prohibit it from happening again.

The usual requirement is that anyone involved in the incident is tested for drugs and alcohol. This will include all personnel on the bridge at the time, and all personnel at the mooring stations, as well as the pilot and all crew on the tugs.

Not sure what you are referring to in his post, but I do know what the exchange card is, and I also know that since the pilot is not an employee of the cruise line, he/she are not allowed to touch any control, switch, or button on the bridge. They even need to ask permission to change the range reading on a radar. They certainly don't operate the engine telegraphs or thruster controls, but give commands to either the bridge officers or Captain for them to carry out.

This does not accurately reflect the Master/Pilot relationship. The Captain is always responsible for the ship, but he/she may delegate "the conn", or the authority to give commands for maneuvering the ship, to the pilot (generally always done), just as he/she does to the bridge officers when the Captain is not on the bridge. The Captain may rescind this authority if he/she feels the ship is in danger. The pilot and tug skippers would only be found responsible if they are found to be grossly negligent, or to not have obeyed orders. With regards to water depth, the cruise line's ISM (International Safety Management) plan requires a given "UKC" (under keel clearance), which specifies the distance between the bottom of the ship and the bottom of the harbor. Since the depth of the ship can vary by load, and the depth of the water can vary by tides, this UKC is the controlling aspect, and is a constant. As to inspection and repair, both the USCG and the classification society will need to inspect, and if there is no tear in the hull, they will likely be able to proceed, with stipulation that at least temporary repairs be made within a given time frame (typically up to 30 days). Given the amount of severe deformation of the hull plating I see in the photo, there will be some plating repairs needed, as well as some structural work behind this. If "dimples" in the hull are not "sharp" but gradual, then the plating is usually left until a scheduled dry docking, and if the framing behind is not severely deformed, then it is frequently just cut out and new framing cut to fit the "new curvature" of the deformed hull.

Lifeboat capacity is based on both weight and volume. Seating in the boat is allocated as being 16" wide and 25" front (knee) to back (butt). Each person is considered to weigh 87.5kg (192.5 lbs). The boat will stay afloat even if full to capacity and also full of water, so the weight issue isn't critical to the boat. The lowering gear is rated to 150% of the rated weight of boat and occupants, so that isn't a real problem. The space is more critical, and to get most people to fit, you need to have one person sitting upright, and the people on either side leaning forward, since most people's shoulders are wider than 16". I have done practical experiments in loading boats to rated capacity, and it is a challenge. As noted, there is lifesaving capacity of 125% of the total number of souls allowed onboard, but not necessarily lifeboat capacity. Lifeboat capacity is required to be 70% of all souls onboard, the rest is made up by liferafts and MES (Marine Evacuation System) rafts. There is to be enough lifeboats and rafts on each side of the ship to take 50% of all souls.

The two new floating docks for Grand Bahamas are supposed to be delivered next year, one of which is capable of lifting the Oasis class ships.

It's called muscle memory. Regardless of how much training a person has, you never know how they will react in an actual emergency, so you try to make the proper response be done reflexively, without conscious thought. Yeah, how's that going to work out with a bunch of vacationers? And, how much longer would that make the muster drill, with the attendant complaints.

Every piece of machinery on the ship needs to be surveyed by the class society at least once every 5 years. Most equipment is on a "continuous" survey schedule, where the surveyor is called out while the ship is in service to inspect machinery and to review maintenance history of work done by the crew over the last year. All of this machinery is to be surveyed annually. A dry dock inspection is required to complete what is known as the "bottom survey", and to survey that equipment that cannot be accessed while the ship is in the water. So, this will include things like weld inspections (to see if they have deteriorated), hull plating thickness readings at hundreds of points on the hull, especially where the bottom paint has been found missing, or areas of corrosion are apparent, inspections of hull fittings like sea chests (where water is drawn into the ship), bilge keels, fathometers, etc, inspections of all valves that are open to the sea (in many cases, removal of the valve to allow full inspection and then reinstalling), application of bottom paint, checking for watertightness of rudders and voids, and of course conditions of propellers, azipods, thrusters, and stabilizers. Those items mentioned above for the "bottom survey" would be "reset" after the dry docking, and good for another 5 years (2.5 years if the ship is over 15 years old). Lots of other things are "reset" during a dry docking, simply because they cannot be done in service, like maintenance to the main electrical switchboard, which requires blacking out sequential areas of the ship during maintenance, but these are not "required" to be done in dry dock. So, to answer your question, no, one visit to dry dock does not "reset" everything. Maintenance of class status is a year round, every year, process, with the surveyor coming to the ship at least once a year and clearing what inspections and surveys can be done at the time. There are probably 30-40 certificates that need to be renewed via surveys, either annually, biennially, or every 5 years.

Allure did a mid-period underwater inspection in lieu of dry docking in Sept 2022. Her next mandated dry docking is Sept 2025. If they were to do upgrades in Feb 2025, as speculated above, they would still need to dry dock in Sept, as you don't get credit for early dockings, it has to be within the specified period either side of the anniversary date the ship was delivered. So, I don't think it's likely that they would do this. They could take the ship out of service for hotel maintenance, but that loses revenue, and then they would lose revenue again when they went for the dry dock.

Even in 2015, this would be a violation of the ship's ISPS Plan (International Ship and Port Security), where even 95% of crew are not allowed in engineering spaces for security reasons. The insurance companies also frown on these due to safety measures, as this also violates the ISM (International Safety Management) Code, which requires certain mandated PPE (Personal Protective Equipment, like hard toed shoes, safety glasses, etc) for everyone in the engineering space, regardless of why they are there (like a tour) or who they are (taking a tour).

I'll step in here and call this for the fallacy that it is. You are comparing a service industry function, where the "guest is always right", to a life threatening situation, where the crew are in command. No, but they do actually "face the beast" by going into a room on fire in drills, and burn buildings that are condemned to experience structural collapse. So, they get training as close as possible to reality in their primary mission. The crew designated to direct passengers to muster, and to conduct the muster, this is their primary mission, and they get no actual training in this under the new muster format. A basic tenet of successful training is to "train like it's real" and make training as realistic as possible. And, firefighters will place another firefighter in a place in a fire simulation where they can escape if necessary, to act as simulated victims.

Almost no ships pump sewage to barges, and anyway, the tanks are not "sealed" as there has to be venting to allow air into/out of the tank as it is filled/emptied. Generally, a sewer smell on ships is caused by dry traps on drains. Drains that don't see water into them often (like the bathroom drain in your cabin, or drains in technical lockers around the ship) have the dry AC air dry out the water in the trap, which allows the odors to come back up from the tank. Notify a crew member about where you smell the odor, and they can pour some water down the drain and the odor immediately goes away.

I was a merchant mariner for 46 years. And, yes, I and my family sacrificed a lot in order for me to practice my desired profession. No, its not indentured service (as I said, since it is a US flag vessel, in a US port, and the crew are US citizens, they can walk off the ship (and did so in the thousands when we first started US flag operations) at any time. There is still a percentage of POA crew that don't complete their first contract. The problem is that most young American kids have never shared a room with a stranger until/if they go to college. Most have never worked 7 days a week without a day off for months, and certainly most have not worked a 12 hour day. And, most importantly, most have not lived where they work, so they are in constant interaction with their co-workers. These are the factors that make cruise ship work extremely unattractive to US citizens.

I know for a fact that the Sky, Sun, Star, Dawn and Spirit have 4 person cabins. The Sun and Sky also had 6 person cabins for casino staff. I'm fairly certain that the Jewel class ships do as well, though its been a while. Because cabin size, and the number of occupants is based on job description, we had severe problems with this when NCL started the US flag operations. All deck and engine crew, per their union contract, were to be only two to a cabin, even though on international ships their job descriptions only warranted 4 to a cabin. Also, junior officers that were two to a cabin on international ships were required, again by union contract, to be in single cabins. This required a major shifting of cabin assignments before we even crewed up, and led to a lot of hotel supervisors getting their nose out of joint. Some of the more junior single cabins were about 6' x 8', just enough room for a single bed, sink and mirror, wardrobe, and 2' wide desk. These shared the toilet and shower with the adjoining cabin.

I assume you are talking about POA crew, not international crew, as this is certainly not the case. This argument is trotted out a lot, but unless the crew member is living in his/her parent's basement, they will be paying rent on the apartment they use when not working, or where their family lives, and have utility bills as well. Sorry, again, federal labor laws for seafarers allows for up to 70 hours of work per week, just like the international crew. This is why the cruise fare is so high. And, what of those crew who aren't off duty during the day? Or they have personal matters to attend to, like doing their laundry? The newer ships have gone to 2 to a cabin, due to international conventions, but the older ships had mostly 4 to a cabin, and some 6 to a cabin. Spent 4 years on NCL's US flag ships, as well as their international ships.

Unfortunately, there are very few young US citizens who are willing to move away from home for 4 months, work 12-14 hours a day, 7 days a week, with no day off for 4 months, for minimum wage, and share a 80-90 square foot cabin with 3 complete strangers. Let alone be subject to random drug and alcohol testing.

Unfortunately, no lines have restarted passenger service on cargo ships since the pandemic. They may do so in the future, but it is a decided side line for the companies, so they may not feel it is worth it anymore.

This is not the actual case with POA. The other cruise lines that do 12-14 day cruises to Hawaii from the West Coast, charge less for their 12-14 days than POA charges for 7 days, so this competition keeps the prices down on POA, from a sales standpoint (this has been true since NCL started the US operations). The reasons that prices are higher on POA than other cruises are: 1. US wages for the entire crew (even the non-resident alien crew get paid the same as the US crew, by US law) 2. Fuel has to be transported to Hawaii, so it costs more than the ships that fuel on the West Coast. 3. Most of the supplies (food, liquor, and replacement supplies for the hotel and engineering) have to be transported to Hawaii, increasing cost. 4. Most spare parts for the ship come from Europe, and the POA, as a US ship, must pay customs duty on all these parts brought into the US, while foreign flag ships don't (they are "in transit" from overseas to a foreign ship). 5. US crew require more extensive safety training at approved land based training facilities, and the required documentation is more extensive and costlier than foreign crew, which drives up the cost (it costs NCL about $8000 just to get a new crew member to the ship the first time), and because the documentation for US crew is the same as for other merchant seamen, they could get a job at a higher wage on another ship, after having NCL pay for the documentation. This means that there is no standing labor pool of credentialed mariners to crew POA, as there are for foreign ships. 6. US crew can quit and walk off the ship at any time, with no legal complications, unlike the foreign crew, so the foreign crew tend to stay to complete their contracts. There is no more restriction on hours worked for US crew than for foreign crew. The hour limitations on seafarers is set by international convention, so it applies to all. However, US law requires overtime payment (at least 125% of base wage), for hours worked over 40 per week. Even the foreign crew on foreign ships are entitled to this overtime, but their base wage does not have to meet a minimum wage standard like the US crew.

It matters to the port and to agents of shipping lines, in that it determines how many ships can berth along the same pier.

SOLAS requires the crew perform a man overboard drill "monthly, if practicable, but at least twice in 3 months". The fast rescue boat must be deployed in the water monthly, to give the crew training. Most ships will do man overboard drills at anchor (they need permission from the harbor master to launch the rescue boat in harbor), or if they are ahead of schedule and can stop the ship for an hour or so in calm waters.