Refurbishment after The Fire

[LoneStar72]

Seeing the Star now in Bremerhaven for refurbishment after the fire makes me wonder how it's done. Obviously the shipyard has a large crew of skilled workers, who are probably very experienced in building ships -- even cruise ships. And it appears that a lot of work was done during the transit to the shipyard. But where do they get the parts?

 

Even though there are "series" of cruise ships, built mostly alike, there doesn't seem to me to be enough in each series for it to be economically feasible to stock a lot of spare parts for each ship type. Fundamentally, where will the shipyard go to get the materials to replace the balconies, doors, cabin walls, etc., that were damaged by the fire on the Star? Complicating matters, Princess says that the Star will be back in service in a month -- that means that parts have to be mostly on hand, because it would take longer than a month just to find suppliers for all the necessary matching parts, have them under contract, get the parts fabricated, transported to the shipyard, and inspected, much less installed.

 

I guess I'm assuming that Princess wants the damaged areas of the Star repaired to match the rest of the ship (i.e., put back the way it was.) I can't imagine using repair materials that don't match the adjacent, un-damaged areas -- it would be too easy for future passengers to point out (and possibly avoid) the areas that the fire touched.

 

We were on the Star for the 11-night Southern Caribbean Medley over this past New Years', and were sorry to see what happened to her. We're looking forward to seeing her restored to her former beauty.

 

John

[spongerob]

I don't pretend to know all the how's of getting things done. One thing that will make the job a little easier is that the cabins are modular in construction. The supplier (probably someone in Italy) will already be in the process of constructing these modules. They are no different than those that will be used for the Crown Princess, and Emerald Princess. They pretty much just plug right in. Obviously, the water lines, electrical, and all that might need to be replaced but as long as the structure is okay, replacing cabins should be relatively easy. Where the internal structure has been damaged, repair and replacement will be a big job.

 

My grandfather was a shipfitter and welder during WWII. He could literally make anything out of metal. The people who do this work are very good.

[BaumD]

The biggest problem they will have is the smell of smoke. Although I have never worked on a fire damaged ship, I have restored numerous office buildings and apartment buildings damaged by fire. Removing the burned portions of the ship and replacing them is the easy part.

 

If they can't get rid of the smoke smell, they won't be finished with the refurbishment. The smoke gets everywhere outside of the immediate fire area. Every square inch of smoke and soot must be cleaned or sealed in or it will continue to smell. Think about it, the smell of smoke has probably gotten thru most of the ship. It is above the ceilings, in the air conditioning ducts, in every little nook and cranny you can imagine. Every surface visible or concealed is now covered with smoke and soot. They must figure out how to get to all of these areas and clean up the soot.

 

I am predicting that the first group of new passengers come back complaining that the ship smells like smoke.

[c-legs]

:) BAUM D....Right on !!!!

 

Your prediction is spot on; likewise, your assertions about the smoke damage being way more longlasting and invasive are dead accurate.

The shipyard has one heck of a task facing it....

 

Cheers

CG

[custompcsys]

I really hope this doesn't turn into yet another "they will never fix it in time, fix it right, she will be out of service for months on end, etc, etc" thread about the Star. My favorite was where people had her being cut in half to cut out and replace the section with the massive structural damage!

 

So far Princess has done nothing but exactly what they said they would do when they said they would do it. Have a little faith and let the experts do what they get paid to do. They know more than we do.

[Colo Cruiser]

It will be fixed as good as new and you will never know the difference. :)

[CroozBlooz]

Coming from someone who sailed on an early voyage of the Sapphire (nee Diamond), I smelled no smoke at all, and that ship was damaged pretty severely by fire during construction. It may be a different situation when the ship is completed and then suffers a fire.

 

I certainly hope they are able to remove all of the smell of smoke, as we will be aboard the Star in October!

[JLC@SD]

I really hope this doesn't turn into yet another "they will never fix it in time, fix it right, she will be out of service for months on end, etc, etc" thread about the Star. My favorite was where people had her being cut in half to cut out and replace the section with the massive structural damage!

 

So far Princess has done nothing but exactly what they said they would do when they said they would do it. Have a little faith and let the experts do what they get paid to do. They know more than we do.

 

I would expect that Princess will spare no expense to get the job done as every day the ship is out of service costs them close to 1 million a day (i.e. 2,500 passengers @ say 400 / day)

[Goldryder]

Having read about this company just completing work involving adding balconies to two existing ships and seeing their position in respect to where Star is now, I would not be surprised if this company have been employed to assist in the repairs by replacing the balconies that were destroyed in the fire.

 

If you click on 'products & services' and scroll to second section, it has a clickable link regarding balconies. That gives a brief description of what is entailed.

 

The company builds complete balconies and welds them onto a ship, they just completed the ex Celebrity Horizon, now Island Star which went from no balconies to 120 and her sister Island Escape which now has an extra 20 balconies, all built and fitted by this company based in Finland. The work was carried out in Lisbon where the two ships were being refurbished side by side.

 

http://www.synkronex.com/homepage.php?id=1

 

Star Princess was moved into full drydock overnight and there is every chance that Synkronex had been brought in when she was still in Nassau and they may have started fabrication of the replacement balconies before she left for Germany. The cabin modules will have been started at the same time by the Lloyd-Werft onsite factory in Germany, that way a few would have been sat on the quayside waiting for her arrival.

 

Its still going to be pushing it, timewise, but providing they don't have any serious problems, they may manage the turnround. No-one can say at this early stage.

[Colo Cruiser]

Hey if they can cut an RCCL ship in half and add a 70 foot section to lengthen it then refurbishing the Star should be a peace of cake. :)

[Goldryder]

Hey if they can cut an RCCL ship in half and add a 70 foot section to lengthen it then refurbishing the Star should be a peace of cake. :)

 

 

The yard where Star Princess is now is the same yard that stretched NCL's Dream, Sky and Wind. There was a 60 day turnround on each ship and it was completed on time...just.

[rjg41]

Yes, the cabins are modular and slide right into place. Many are identical in many areas of the ship. They are identical in pairs by area within a ship class and between some classes except for possibly color schemes. I guarantee you that within hours of the fire, inventory assesments were being made and purchase orders were being cut. Since the damaged area is in the section with the most common cabin set up they might have even had some modules in inventory. Before the decision to dry dock her, I guarantee all the pert charts(time lines) were layed out and all the check points established.

 

My bigger concern is that they stablish the cause and why it spread so quickly.

[LoneStar72]

The biggest problem they will have is the smell of smoke.

I understand the magnitude of that problem. But I guess I've always been impressed with whatever substance or process the cabin stewards use to clean cabins between cruises, such that even when there's been a smoker (or two) in there for a week (or longer), the passengers on the next cruise usually can't tell (I know, there are exceptions). And, of course, the hyper-sensitive to smoke will complain anyway, like they do about public areas of most ships where smokers are permitted.

 

Thanks for all the info on the ongoing refurb of the Star -- I'm learning a lot about something I'd never thought about before. It would sure make a great topic for a PBS program or some other type of documentary.

 

My bigger concern is that they stablish the cause and why it spread so quickly.

That's certainly more important, but there are multiple threads in the Princess forum already discussing that, and I didn't see a thread talking solely about the refurbishment.

 

John

[TNTLAMB]

No matter how complete the refurbishment, just based on what is posted on this and other threads, ther will be complaints of smoke smell and demands for compensation.

[sunshine426]

Having been a passenger on the ill fated Star, I can tell you that our cabin and hallway on the Lido Deck Port Side had no smoke or water damage. Our daughters cabin on the starboard side did not smell of smoke, nor did the hallway.

Some of the elevators had a smoky smell, and of course the areas affected by the fire would have. We had smoke in our area of the muster station B during the actual fire, but when we walked around those public areas the next day we could detect very little smoke smell.

[rjg41]

No matter how complete the refurbishment, just based on what is posted on this and other threads, ther will be complaints of smoke smell and demands for compensation.

 

....real, imagined or just seeking some $$$$$.

 

We will be on Star for the 25 day B to B transatlantic in September. We'll see what is real at that time.

[LeeW]

Discovery channel recently had a ship refurbishment show that was really great. Sure would like to see the same thing done for Star. Has to be a huge audience out there wondering what really is involved in restoring a ship after something like this.

[chasetf]

Hey if they can cut an RCCL ship in half and add a 70 foot section to lengthen it then refurbishing the Star should be a peace of cake. :)

I think they had more than 10 days to plan and construct the section, before the ship arrived.