Discovery This week.

[Rebel Rouser]

For info only.

[Hookedoncruising!]

OMG! There was a fire onboard? Was it bad? A shame the cruise is cancelled but getting a full refund is great.

[Jim The Scot]

From Travel Gossip dated 8th July

 

TUI-owned Marella Cruises has cancelled the remainder of its current cruise, as well as the next departure of its ship Discovery after a fire broke out.

Passengers were alerted when fire alarms sounded at around 01:30 local time on Friday 7 July, as the ship was on its way to Grand Turk, during a Caribbean cruise.

TUI said the fire – in one of the ship’s five engines – was quickly extinguished and there were no injuries to passengers or crew.

The ship was escorted to its previous port of call, Amber Cove in the Dominican Republic, where the damage is being assessed.

Passengers on the ship have been told they’ll be flown back to the UK, while Discovery’snext sailing, on Sunday 9 July, has been cancelled.

One passenger described the incident as ‘quite terrifying’, while another said the staff and crew were ‘utterly amazing’.

TUI said: “Due to a small fire in one of the five engines on the Marella Discovery, we have taken the difficult decision to cancel the remainder of the cruise.

 “We understand how disappointing this will be and would like to apologise to our customers who have been impacted and thank them for their patience and understanding at this time.

“The fire was reported whilst the ship was on course in the Caribbean. The fire was quickly extinguished, and no one on board was harmed.

“We understand how concerning this must be for those on board and we would like to assure customers that our crew are highly trained to deal with these sorts of situations.

“Due to the impacts of the fire, we will also be cancelling the next cruise due to depart from Port Canaveral on Sunday.

“Our customer teams will be in contact with those customers impacted and will support them with their future travel plans.

“Depending on customers’ outward travel dates, those impacted will either be offered a full or pro-rata refund, as well as holiday vouchers as a gesture of goodwill.

“Our teams are currently arranging for all passengers to be brought home.

“We would once again like to thank customers for their patience and understanding and apologise for the inconvenience caused.”

 

These dates dont tie in with RR

 

If we had stuck with our initial booking our cruise would have been cancelled as were due on her on the 9th July.We switched to the 23rd

Edited July 8, 2023 by Jim The Scot

[Hookedoncruising!]

Thanks for the reply Jim. It must have been awful, and so disappointing to come home early. Hopefully all will be okay for you going 🤞

 

[Jim The Scot]

Thanks H
 

Yeah,must be disappointing for for those that have to come home early and also for those due to go out on the 9th to have their whole cruise/holiday cancelled

 

Must have been a scary experience for those on board but the main thing everyone is safe and sound

[Mannamead17]

On 7/8/2023 at 12:06 PM, Hookedoncruising! said:

OMG! There was a fire onboard? Was it bad? A shame the cruise is cancelled but getting a full refund is great.

Getting a full refund is not great it's merely the very least you would expect.

I spent an unrecoverable £200 on hotel and train tickets which will not be compensated by TUI, all I got offered was £100 each voucher for future bookings

Worst thing being we only knew not to travel to Gatwick due to the Facebook group we are in. It took TUI until 1 pm to ring me, 2.5 hours after we were due to travel.

[Cliffholl55]

Have to agree with you, our Cuba cruise was cancelled in January with TUI giving us 24 hours notice. There compo is the pits and there not bothered and won’t listen to you. 
 I’m beginning to think there ships are getting past there sell by date but unfortunately weve booked for 3 Rd time to Cuba next January with last 2 cancelled..  

they say 3rd time lucky 

[ladyjayneq]

Jim the Scot, 

Was thinking of you and trying to work out if you would be affected. 

Here's hoping you get away ok 🤞

We're still awaiting hubbys passport before we can book. 

[gramwold]

hope you get away ok  Jim.   I looked on flight radar just and the flight  from Melbourne  airport  back to Manchester  had a flight  number  TOM179 I am tracking  one with flight number  TOM179P going to  La Romana in Dominican Republic landing in 25 mins.  I think maybe to pick up some of  Discovery  Manchester passengers. If true  they will have had a long coach journey from Amber cove of about  150 miles or so. will keep an eye  on it.

[Jim The Scot]

5 hours ago, Mannamead17 said:

Getting a full refund is not great it's merely the very least you would expect.

I spent an unrecoverable £200 on hotel and train tickets which will not be compensated by TUI, all I got offered was £100 each voucher for future bookings

Worst thing being we only knew not to travel to Gatwick due to the Facebook group we are in. It took TUI until 1 pm to ring me, 2.5 hours after we were due to travel.

Hi M

 

Initially we were booked to go today but changed to the 23rd(long story)so feel for you….you must be gutted missing your cruise ,we would have been and could still be 😅

 

£100 each voucher is a pittance and hardly constitutes compensation but am I surprised?not really,its TUI after all and also not surprised by the late contact.Your £100 compo will be swallowed up by their increased prices

 

Was it marella/ tui facebook group you found out preTUI call?

Ps

 

No consolation to you but popped into our local TUI store on passing not expecting them to know anything regarding what had happened with Discovery but shockarooni they did..Told me only todays flight/ cruise schedule cancelled and will be running from the 16th.Saying that,if they told me its was thunder and lightening with torrential rain outside i,d stick my head out to make sure

 

Hopefully you get something sorted to compensate this disaster

 

 

26 minutes ago, ladyjayneq said:

Jim the Scot, 

Was thinking of you and trying to work out if you would be affected. 

Here's hoping you get away ok 🤞

We're still awaiting hubbys passport before we can book. 

Thanks ladyjay but no we,re not affected at the moment as we dont go until the 23rd but we.re talking about TUI  so not counting my chickens yet

 

You been waiting long for Hubs passport?

[Jim The Scot]

12 minutes ago, gramwold said:

hope you get away ok  Jim.   I looked on flight radar just and the flight  from Melbourne  airport  back to Manchester  had a flight  number  TOM179 I am tracking  one with flight number  TOM179P going to  La Romana in Dominican Republic landing in 25 mins.  I think maybe to pick up some of  Discovery  Manchester passengers. If true  they will have had a long coach journey from Amber cove of about  150 miles or so. will keep an eye  on it.

Thanks G

 

Been busy tracking our intended flight from glasgow to melbourne and never occurred to me to check flights from melbourne to DR

 

Spoke with TUI at local store today and said the flights taken passengers  home from DR may well not take them back to the airport they departed from so suspect main flights will go back to London and then bus to other destinations  for the many

[gramwold]

yes maybe so Jim, but as the flight  TOM179P  took off from  Melbourne airport to DM  i think maybe it has the land based customers on board who have been holidaying in Florida. i will look in a couple of hours to see where the plane is going next.

[Jim The Scot]

I,ll need to take your word for it G as cant find or track any flight from Melbourne to DM 😁

 

I wouldn,t be a happy bunny if i had been on a land based hol expecting to be returning direct to find out i,d be returning via DM

 

Keep us up to date

[gramwold]

will do  Jim.

[gramwold]

hiya, TOM179 took off from La Romana  to Manchester  at 11.50pm our time and that is the flight no  that was due to fly from Melbourne to Manchester.  Also  just watched a tui flight  from Punta Cana in DR take off at 12.16AM our time flying to Gatwick flight no TOM055.

[Jim The Scot]

Thanks G

 

Not sure what happened regards the glasgow flight(TOM 629) from Melbourne scheduled to depart at 13-25 yesterday

Was due to land in Glasgow at 02-15 this morning but showing estimated arrival time as 11-20 on flightstats

[Jim The Scot]

Glasgow flight eventually arrived back home at 10-58 from La Romana so thats flown from Melbourne-DR-Glasgow

[ladyjayneq]

Jim the Scot

 

had email re passport this morning, it’s about to be printed so hopefully we’ll get it soon. Then I can get the cruise booked and hope there’s still seats on the flight. 
 

will keep fingers crossed for you that yours goes ahead. 
 

we were booked on one of the Thomson ships some years ago just after the accident with the lifeboat. It was 10:30 the night before we left that I finally got an answer from Thomson that we were going. Everyone on board got a bottle of fizz for the uncertainty but as you can imagine the mood of the crew was low when we went into the same port and the lifeboat was still sitting on the dock. 

[Coalman]

13 hours ago, Jim The Scot said:

Glasgow flight eventually arrived back home at 10-58 from La Romana so thats flown from Melbourne-DR-Glasgow

We were on this flight!!  Boy, was is a wearisome days travelling! We originally flew out to Port Canaveral on Sunday, June 25th from Birmingham.  We were told, by letter that was slipped under the door on Saturday 9th night that we would be leaving Dom Republic on Sunday 10th.  The letter stated we would be flying to GLASGOW and coached back to Brum! The transfer from Amber Cove to DR airport, La Romana, took over FIVE hours ( from 1pm - 6.15pm ), 216 miles.  The Dreamliner should have departed at 9.15pm according to the letter but by the time the plane was cleared for take off it was nearly 10pm. EIGHT hours later ( 6am DR/ 11am UK time) we arrived at rainy Glasgow with the unenviable thought of a 330mile coach journey back to Brum! ( I have just looked at all the roadworks on this stretch!!!!!  https://www.google.co.uk/maps/dir/Glasgow+Airport+(GLA),+Glasgow,+Paisley+PA3+2ST/Birmingham+Airport+(BHX),+Birmingham+B26+3QJ/@53.8839755,-4.0767337,7z/data=!4m14!4m13!1m5!1m1!1s0x48884eb90111e0dd:0x24a888b519aa330b!2m2!1d-4.4332077!2d55.8697587!1m5!1m1!1s0x4870b0deff56c9e3:0xd7fab23579355bb!2m2!1d-1.7435093!2d52.4523818!3e0?entry=ttu     We decided to let the train take the strain and although not perfect ( 2 changes ) we did get to our home town station by 1.10pm( DR time ) 6.10pm UK.  So the whole trip had taken over 24hours to get back home. The trains were excellent on time keeping.  Those poor souls on that coach journey from Glasgow to Brum would have had an even longer journey time back...and then they had to get to their homes from Birmingham airport.  Marella called the return travel 'repatriation' in their cruise letter to us, I presume that is for legal/small print reasons.  My body-clock is awry, hence I am writing this at 12.30am, UK time! 

Edited July 11, 2023 by Coalman

[Coalman]

It appears that the original people from Birmingham on the 25th June were split between the Glasgow and the Gatwick 'repatriation' flights for our return journey.  No BHX flight was provided.  One lady had driven to Brum from Devon on the 24/25th June and had that journey 'onwards' after her coach transfer from Glasgow! She had no option but to use the coaches as her car was at Birmingham!  

The passengers who embarked on the 2nd July for their  2 week cruise will be given a full refund.  Most of them have opted to stay on the ship until it gets to Melbourne by their scheduled last day of 16th July ( why wouldn't you??!!) whereby they will be flying home as normal.  The Captain hopes to be able to stop at some ports on the way back to Melbourne once his paperwork/certification is in order, apparently.

[Coalman]

13 hours ago, Jim The Scot said:

Glasgow flight eventually arrived back home at 10-58 from La Romana so thats flown from Melbourne-DR-Glasgow

There is a report on FakeBook that NINE passengers were left stranded at La Romana and missed the flight due to their coach transfer being held up in traffic on their long 5hr transfer.  Unless their coach ONLY contained those 9 people, I find it difficult to believe.  What happened to the other coach passengers? They claim they have to stay at the airport overnight until another flight can be found..... 

[Coalman]

Discovery is back on the road again by the looks of it..... https://www.cruisemapper.com/?imo=9070632

[gsgbrumuk]

My understanding is the the Birmingham flight flew from Melbourne to Birmingham with the land based holidaymakers and then they were redistributed from Birmingham.

We were put on the Gatwick flight which was late taking off due to luggage difficulties and also some passengers being on the Gatwick plane instead of the Glasgow plane.

I understand the Gatwick plane arrived in Melbourne on Saturday and flew over to La Romana DR on Sunday evening.  From Gatwick we then underwent a 3 hour coach journey to Birmingham  Then we got a taxi home.  From leaving the ship at 11:15 local time we were travelling just shy of 23 hours.

[Coalman]

Yes, gsgbrum, it was a bit of a heavy day, wasn't it?  You did well to get from Gatwick to Brum in 3hrs. by coach.  I see that Discovery is just a couple of hours from Port Canaveral right now..... the 2/7/23 cruisers have had a mighty-fine fortnight, havent they? lol  And good luck  to them, too! 👏😊

[Jim The Scot]

Thats Discovery arrived safe and sound  at Port Canaveral

 

Another three days off AI and free food for the passengers who stayed on for the long sail from Amber Cove