Muster drill outside???

[SadieN]

Things have changed a bit.  

Since December we've sailed the Inspiration and Imagination four times.  Every muster has been inside. Weather has not been an issue.  Both are Fantasy class ships.

 

[Saint Greg]

Book Dream or Vista class if you want to be inside.

[Saint Greg]

8 minutes ago, SadieN said:

Things have changed a bit.  

Since December we've sailed the Inspiration and Imagination four times.  Every muster has been inside. Weather has not been an issue.  Both are Fantasy class ships.

 

 

It's been a few years but on my three Elation cruises our muster was mostly inside...Then at the end they'd walk us outside to see the lifeboats.

 

The ships where the entire muster was outside for me were Triumph and Freedom. I'd imagine my upcoming Glory cruise will be outside as well.

 

 

 

Edited May 21, 2019 by Saint Greg

[Aplmac]

26 minutes ago, BellaSweet said:

My first cruise, I showed up as soon as possible..

and I was against the wall with rows and rows of people in front of me.

I learned 🙂 ===> Me too. No more rush.

.

LOL - Bin there done that, against the wall.

 

Hey, I think I see you somewhere here

in these pics of our favorite way to start a cruise.

I quite liked the (timing of the) muster drill ex San Juan,

because it started at 9-9:30 p.m,. long after sunset!

First two pics are Victory, ex SJ,PR - at night

.

[Doggielover68]

Don't blame the ship, blame the jerks who don't show up on time. Last time on the Conquest, there were 150+ people who were late and they listed all of them by cabin number while we stood there waiting for half an hour. It sucks but it is what it is.

 

I feel the need to add that the whole purpose of the drill is to instruct people where to go during an emergency, that is why it is outside at the actual muster stations. Also, it is a drill for the crew. There are new crew members every week and they need to be familiar with the protocol on that particular ship. In a real emergency, they are not going to instruct 3000 cruise passengers to head to the nearest air conditioned lounge in order to be led in a single file line to the life boats. 

 

Muster drills are almost always hot, stuffy, cramped and uncomfortable...but it is a very short segment of your trip. 

Edited May 21, 2019 by Doggielover68

[Aplmac]

What I find really scary about the whole lifeboat thing...

Have you ever noticed the capacity numbers printed on their hulls??

 

If not, perhaps you should pay attention to ..like.. 150 ppl per tiny lifeboat!

with nooo Cheers on board..

sitting cheek-by-jowl next to 149 other hot, sweaty, non-airconditioned ppl

 

It sounds like fun -and I hope I never have to do it!
Lifeboats on the BIG Ships like Allure and Oasis display capacity numbers around 250!
Oh Bliss, oh JOY!

[gtouch]

3 minutes ago, Aplmac said:

What I find really scary about the whole lifeboat thing...

Have you ever noticed the capacity numbers printed on their hulls??

 

If not, perhaps you should pay attention to ..like.. 150 ppl per tiny lifeboat!

with nooo Cheers on board..

sitting cheek-by-jowl next to 149 other hot, sweaty, non-airconditioned ppl

 

It sounds like fun -and I hope I never have to do it!
Lifeboats on the BIG Ships like Allure and Oasis display capacity numbers around 250!
Oh Bliss, oh JOY!

Good point........I must remember to wear deodorant just in case.

[LittleYiaYia]

4 hours ago, Aplmac said:

.

Maybe so but

did you board at Barbados? where less than 100 ppl board, generally-speaking?

 

No, all 3 times in Puerto Rico.  Each time our muster area was in the theatre.  I don't know where the other areas were. 

[OCruisers]

On our last two out of Charleston we were inside BUT were walked outside to the location of the life boats.  

[Cruise-Crazy]

The last cruise for me was Victory back on May 10th.  Again, it was outside.  During the entire drill nobody stopped talking and they never demonstrated how to put the life vest on. The drill was a total joke.  If there had been a real emergency nobody would have had a clue what to do.  Everyone standing around me that wasn’t talking was on their phone doing various social media. 

[gtouch]

1 hour ago, Cruise-Crazy said:

The last cruise for me was Victory back on May 10th.  Again, it was outside.  During the entire drill nobody stopped talking and they never demonstrated how to put the life vest on. The drill was a total joke.  If there had been a real emergency nobody would have had a clue what to do.  Everyone standing around me that wasn’t talking was on their phone doing various social media. 

Wow I hate to hear that. Every cruise we were on they held us until everyone was accounted for an they went over the the life vest, whistle etc. 

[chengkp75]

15 hours ago, kdawg954 said:

Its not a proper venue to hold something as important as a muster drill . . . Especially if you want people to pay attention and not suffer from a heat stroke.

If you don't feel this is a "proper venue" for the drill, how do you think people will react when its a real emergency.  This is a drill, folks, its supposed to simulate the real thing, that's what training is all about.

11 hours ago, Aplmac said:

What I find really scary about the whole lifeboat thing...

Have you ever noticed the capacity numbers printed on their hulls??

 

If not, perhaps you should pay attention to ..like.. 150 ppl per tiny lifeboat!

with nooo Cheers on board..

sitting cheek-by-jowl next to 149 other hot, sweaty, non-airconditioned ppl

 

It sounds like fun -and I hope I never have to do it!
Lifeboats on the BIG Ships like Allure and Oasis display capacity numbers around 250!
Oh Bliss, oh JOY!

Actually the largest lifeboats, like on the Oasis class ships have a capacity of 370.  Lifeboat capacity is based on an 86kg person (190lbs), and the space allocated is 18" wide and 24" from knees to back of butt.  Food amounts to 2400 calories per person (about one day's normal diet) of dry, nasty granola type bars, and 3 liters of water per person.  That's total, not per day.  And while the Oasis type boats have a "toilet", it is not a "bathroom" it is open, so everyone gets to enjoy, and the smaller boats use the "big blue toilet" outside the boat for sanitation.

[chengkp75]

6 hours ago, Cruise-Crazy said:

The last cruise for me was Victory back on May 10th.  Again, it was outside.  During the entire drill nobody stopped talking and they never demonstrated how to put the life vest on. The drill was a total joke.  If there had been a real emergency nobody would have had a clue what to do.  Everyone standing around me that wasn’t talking was on their phone doing various social media. 

While I agree that folks not listening and talking make the drill more difficult, it is what we expect from the herd of cats.  The only real important take away from a passenger drill is to know where and when to show up.  The rest of the information is good to have, but not life critical.  In a real emergency, you would be told at the time, and led to what to do.

 

The 3 rules for passengers:  Show up, Shut up, Listen up.  And the first is the really important one.

 

Crew take a very different attitude towards passenger behavior when it is the real thing.  They have been trained to allow nearly all guest behavior all the time as an adjunct of the service industry.  But when they know that their lives depend on how the cats behave, they change that attitude quickly.  Carnival, unfortunately, appears to be one of the worst lines with regards to enforcing rules during drills, with other lines having Captains making announcements that the drill will not progress further until the cats are paying attention, but this also depends on the Captains' own sense of professional responsibility.

[Aplmac]

46 minutes ago, chengkp75 said:

Actually the largest lifeboats, like on the Oasis class ships

have a capacity of 370. 

Lifeboat capacity is based on an 86kg person (190lbs),

and the space allocated is 18" wide and 24" from knees to back of butt.

 

Food amounts to 2400 calories per person (about one day's normal diet)

of dry, nasty granola type bars, and 3 liters of water per person. 

That's total, not per day. 

 

And while the Oasis type boats have a "toilet", it is not a "bathroom"

it is open, so everyone gets to enjoy,

and the smaller boats use the "big blue toilet" outside the boat for sanitation.

.

And again I say.....

It sounds like fun -and I hope I never have to do it!
Oh Bliss, oh JOY!

[Cruise-Crazy]

5 hours ago, gtouch said:

Wow I hate to hear that. Every cruise we were on they held us until everyone was accounted for an they went over the the life vest, whistle etc. 

All they did was wait for everyone to arrive, read the script over the PA and release everyone. 

[Cruise-Crazy]

1 hour ago, chengkp75 said:

While I agree that folks not listening and talking make the drill more difficult, it is what we expect from the herd of cats.  The only real important take away from a passenger drill is to know where and when to show up.  The rest of the information is good to have, but not life critical.  In a real emergency, you would be told at the time, and led to what to do.

 

The 3 rules for passengers:  Show up, Shut up, Listen up.  And the first is the really important one.

 

Crew take a very different attitude towards passenger behavior when it is the real thing.  They have been trained to allow nearly all guest behavior all the time as an adjunct of the service industry.  But when they know that their lives depend on how the cats behave, they change that attitude quickly.  Carnival, unfortunately, appears to be one of the worst lines with regards to enforcing rules during drills, with other lines having Captains making announcements that the drill will not progress further until the cats are paying attention, but this also depends on the Captains' own sense of professional responsibility.

It just seems that every cruise they do less at the drill.  I have done this enough to know what to do but these short cruises are full of first time cruisers that would not have a clue after something like that.  Even if you wanted to pay attention it would be difficult, you could barely hear anything that was being said. I’m comparing the same ship from Feb to May. 

[Hunter69]

Yes; here in Australia; it's held outside. One side is shaded, the other side is not. Yes it gets to 100" nearly every 2nd day in Sydney over summer..

The only thing now is the Bastards who show up late, They have started calling out there cabin numbers now, before they start the muster.. LOL

The only worse one was Singapore; ok it was only 92' but being on The Equator; The Humidity was a killer... Lucky I had the shaded side of The Spirit...

 

[shof515]

4 hours ago, chengkp75 said:

That's total, not per day.  And while the Oasis type boats have a "toilet", it is not a "bathroom" it is open, so everyone gets to enjoy, and the smaller boats use the "big blue toilet" outside the boat for sanitation.

 

so there is no privacy when using the toilet..wow..that is not good and is something that will make me feel very uncomfortable  

[chengkp75]

1 hour ago, shof515 said:

 

so there is no privacy when using the toilet..wow..that is not good and is something that will make me feel very uncomfortable  

Trust me, when you're in a lifeboat, modesty is the last thing on your mind.  Vomiting is also a public spectacle in the boats, and is dealt with by the bilge pump.

[chengkp75]

On 5/21/2019 at 2:02 PM, Honolulu Blue said:

 

Thanks again for the thorough explanation.  

 

This got me wondering about Carnival's redone ships, the Sunshine (formerly Destiny) and Sunrise (formerly Triumph).  Do/did those ships have to have their muster stations changed, since they were stretched, cabins added, and promenade deck space possibly changed?  

That is visited whenever new cabins are installed, as to whether existing muster locations can handle the additional people, whether some need to be shifted to other stations, or whether new stations need to be assigned.

[Aplmac]

14 hours ago, OCruisers said:

On our last two out of Charleston we were inside

BUT were walked outside to the location of the life boats.  

.

I reckon that ^ makes an excellent  compromise!

 

So much of  any muster drill is just yadda yadda yadda

but it also must include the emergency location on the most serious deck on board

after the Navigation Bridge and Engine Rooms

- a deck you'll never see again, until your next cruise.

[nissach]

If I am remembering correctly all of our muster drills on Carnival have been outside.  On NCL it was held in our muster station assigned to our room.

[Aplmac]

4 hours ago, shof515 said:

so there is no privacy when using the toilet..wow..that is not good

and is something that will make me feel very uncomfortable  

.

And that is why .....

you brought your special Rosary -the one bought in Rome at the Vatican?

 

AND why you say 'Very Special Prayers' at night, when on your cruise!

[Aplmac]

4 hours ago, chengkp75 said:

Trust me, when you're in a lifeboat, modesty is the last thing on your mind. 

 

Vomiting is also a public spectacle in the boats,

and is dealt with by the bilge pump.

.

Uh-oh!  MORE very special prayers!.....................

[MauiWowie57]

On 5/21/2019 at 9:58 AM, MRSG29 said:

The Vista was the only ship I been on where they had the Muster inside in the MDR. The rest have all been outside.

And I sailed on the Vista on her inaugural Trans-Atlantic and frankly was surprised we got to do it inside.

The one Princess cruise I took in ... 2015?... featured an inside muster; but my most recent HAL this past Christmas was..back outside.  If anyone can decode it, I'm curious!?

Edited May 22, 2019 by MauiWowie57