How many cruse ships can reach at least 25 knots?

[ren0312]

How many cruise ships now in operation can reach at least 25 knots maximum speed, which is consider very fast for a mere cruise ship? I recall the Superstar Virgo reaching 25.5 knots when she was brand new back in 2000, but she is more than 20 years ago now, so I doubt if she  can still reach 25 knots. I exclude the Queen Mary 2 here since she is an ocean liner.

[BillB48]

Not too many AFAIK.  HAL has a couple of their R class, Amsterdam and Rotterdam, Royal Caribbeans Radiance class ships, Brilliance, Radiance, Serenade and Jewel.  NCL's Norwegian Dawn can do 25.  Those are the ones I can come with.

[navybankerteacher]

Queen Mary 2 can make close to 30 knots, but they are alone in that speed class;   there are probably about a dozen ships which can make 25 knots - some HAL ships and a few of Royal Caribbean and NCL.  Most cruise ships are in the low 20’s.

[Heidi13]

Cruise ships capable of 25 kts mostly date from the late 90's, early 2000's, when bunker prices were significantly lower when the performance criteria were established.

 

Would be interested to know QM2's fuel consumption with 4 DG's & 2 GT's running. Best guess is 400 to 450 tons per day at full speed, as on SS Oriana at 32 kts, fuel burn was about 500 tons per day.

 

With respect to Superstar Virgo, provided she is well maintained and they can afford the fuel, she should still be capable of making the speed. Have operated many Ro/Pax up to 50 yrs old and they could still achieve design speed, if required. 😀

[JimnKaren]

We were on Pacific Princess off the coast of central America. Someone on board got quite ill and we were not in a position (weather and location) to get that person airlifted. An announcement was made and I asked several of the bar personnel how fast we might go to get to where we needed to be. None of them thought it would be more than 22 knots. Yet, in the morning, an announcement came across that we had, in fact, approached 26 knots. Waters were calm and Pacific Princess, although older, is a small ship and we cranked it out. It was neat to see how the captain and his crew reacted to that situation. Really enjoy our times on Pacific Princess.

Jim

Edited April 23, 2020 by JimnKaren

[TheOldBear]

44 minutes ago, Heidi13 said:

Cruise ships capable of 25 kts mostly date from the late 90's, early 2000's, when bunker prices were significantly lower when the performance criteria were established.

 

Would be interested to know QM2's fuel consumption with 4 DG's & 2 GT's running. Best guess is 400 to 450 tons per day at full speed, as on SS Oriana at 32 kts, fuel burn was about 500 tons per day.

 

With respect to Superstar Virgo, provided she is well maintained and they can afford the fuel, she should still be capable of making the speed. Have operated many Ro/Pax up to 50 yrs old and they could still achieve design speed, if required. 😀

 

At an onboard talk, Steve Payne mentioned the dramatic improvement in fuel efficiency from the original steam powered Queen Mary to the CODAG [COmbined Diesel And Gas turbine] QM2

 

The original got 12 feet to the gallon, the QM2 gets 16 feet to the gallon 😉

[Aquahound]

One of the world's largest cruise ships, Harmony of the Seas, is capable of exceeding 25 knots. 

[jocap]

We were sailing in the Atlantic towards Barbados on one of the Grand Class ships (used by Princess/P&O, 116,000 tonnage), when someone  became seriously ill.

The captain increased speed to 23 knots, and explained that he could sail at 26 kn, but it would be very unpleasant for us all.

[Downdie]

I believe the last cruise ships built for speed were the twin ships built by Blohm and Voss for Royal Olympic Cruises in 2000/2001.Designed to sail at 28 knots, the 25000 tonne Olympic Voyager and Olympic Explorer sailed 7 night 3 continent round trips from Athens. Unfortunately, the lines first new builds and 9/11 bankrupted the company. They’re still sailing somewhere, but I can’t recall where.

[CruiserBruce]

17 minutes ago, Downdie said:

I believe the last cruise ships built for speed were the twin ships built by Blohm and Voss for Royal Olympic Cruises in 2000/2001.Designed to sail at 28 knots, the 25000 tonne Olympic Voyager and Olympic Explorer sailed 7 night 3 continent round trips from Athens. Unfortunately, the lines first new builds and 9/11 bankrupted the company. They’re still sailing somewhere, but I can’t recall where.

Google is your friend. Explorer is operated by Diamond Cruises as the Glory Sea. Voyager is now the Chinese Taishan, owned by a Chinese ferry company.

[SRF]

On 4/23/2020 at 1:28 PM, TheOldBear said:

At an onboard talk, Steve Payne mentioned the dramatic improvement in fuel efficiency from the original steam powered Queen Mary to the CODAG [COmbined Diesel And Gas turbine] QM2

 

The original got 12 feet to the gallon, the QM2 gets 16 feet to the gallon 😉

 

Many years ago, Road & Track magazine did a fun "car" test on some unusual vehicle for their April issue.  They even did fuel consumption and performance measurements.

 

One year, they did one of the QM ships, I would have to dig to find the issue.

[NantahalaCruiser]

https://www.cruisecritic.com/articles.cfm?ID=4041

[getting older slowly]

Not a cruise ship    but the same size as I believe R class ships like Azamara

 

The Spirit of Tasmania Ferry between Melbourne and Devonport in Australia

 

Basic facts 194m long  29338 Gross Tonnage  power 4 x  10560kw V16's  via twin props

 

Max Speed 30.9 knots   Average speed for its 430km trip across Bass Strait is 27 knots, in all weather

 

Also the Max Speed, it at the limit using the old formula 

hull speed in knots equals 1.34 times the square root of the waterline length in feet 

 

Just for info an r-class  only has  4 x  3370kw v12's  via twin props  with a max of 18 knots

 

Cheers Don

Edited April 26, 2020 by getting older slowly
Add details r class

[sverigecruiser]

 

When we cruised on Norwegian Wind 2004 the captain often announced that the speed was 25 knots. I'm not sure if she's still sailing under another name or if she is gone now.

[CruiserBruce]

2 hours ago, sverigecruiser said:

 

When we cruised on Norwegian Wind 2004 the captain often announced that the speed was 25 knots. I'm not sure if she's still sailing under another name or if she is gone now.

Again, Google is your friend. She is now with Star Cruises as SuperStar Aquarius.

[sverigecruiser]

51 minutes ago, CruiserBruce said:

Again, Google is your friend. She is now with Star Cruises as SuperStar Aquarius.

 

Thank you.

 

I know that Google is my friend, I just didn't bother to look since it wasn't important for me.

[Heidi13]

16 hours ago, getting older slowly said:

Not a cruise ship    but the same size as I believe R class ships like Azamara

 

The Spirit of Tasmania Ferry between Melbourne and Devonport in Australia

 

Basic facts 194m long  29338 Gross Tonnage  power 4 x  10560kw V16's  via twin props

 

Max Speed 30.9 knots   Average speed for its 430km trip across Bass Strait is 27 knots, in all weather

 

Also the Max Speed, it at the limit using the old formula 

hull speed in knots equals 1.34 times the square root of the waterline length in feet 

 

Just for info an r-class  only has  4 x  3370kw v12's  via twin props  with a max of 18 knots

 

Cheers Don

 

Wow, that's an impressive speed, especially for these days. Certainly has an impressive engine installation and lots of horse-power at about 56,000 HP. My last ship was 470 cars and 2,000 pax, but with 20,000 HP we only made 21 kts.

 

With the exception of the high speed ferries, I haven't achieved 30 kts since working on the steam ships.🙁

[Aquahound]

She's of a bygone era, but the SS United States averaged 34 knots crossing the Atlantic.  She's the fastest cruise liner ever built.  I really hope they go through with the plans to restore her because it was kinda sad to see her rusting away at the dock in Philly. 

[chengkp75]

9 hours ago, Aquahound said:

She's of a bygone era, but the SS United States averaged 34 knots crossing the Atlantic.  She's the fastest cruise liner ever built.  I really hope they go through with the plans to restore her because it was kinda sad to see her rusting away at the dock in Philly. 

Unfortunately, she is gutted, so anything they do to "restore" her would not be original, and her machinery has been sitting for so long it is rusting away, and the propulsion machinery is, to me, what makes her historically significant.  However, she also used 180Mw of power to push a 45,000 ton displacement hull, while Harmony uses 60Mw to push a 100,000 ton displacement hull at 70% of the speed of the SSUS.

 

To the OP, my question is, who wants to push a cruise ship to 25 knots.  Most are designed for the 22-24 knot range, and those last 1-2 knots uses up a vast amount of fuel (since both fuel consumption to engine power, and engine power to ship speed are exponential relationships), and where do you need to go in a hurry?  Take a plane.

[Heidi13]

3 hours ago, chengkp75 said:

Unfortunately, she is gutted, so anything they do to "restore" her would not be original, and her machinery has been sitting for so long it is rusting away, and the propulsion machinery is, to me, what makes her historically significant.  However, she also used 180Mw of power to push a 45,000 ton displacement hull, while Harmony uses 60Mw to push a 100,000 ton displacement hull at 70% of the speed of the SSUS.

 

To the OP, my question is, who wants to push a cruise ship to 25 knots.  Most are designed for the 22-24 knot range, and those last 1-2 knots uses up a vast amount of fuel (since both fuel consumption to engine power, and engine power to ship speed are exponential relationships), and where do you need to go in a hurry?  Take a plane.

 

Wow, just checked the specs and she made 38 kts on trials - impressive. She had double the boilers, as fitted to SS Oriana and Canberra and 3 times the Horsepower. Fuel consumption must have been well > 1,000 tons per day at full speed.

 

Having spent most of the past 4 months cruising at 12 to 15 kts, it was most relaxing. Did my time on large high speed Ro/Pax at 40+ kts, no desire to go back. Even on a calm day, the wind over the deck wasn't much fun when going for a walk🙁