repair & refurbishment project
Pride of America undergoes groundbreaking installation
Sailing entirely within an emissions control area, Pride of America is the first cruiseship to be fitted with four scrubbers
by Sue Parker
NORWEGIAN CRUISE LINE’S 80,439gt Pride of America has emerged from a US$30 million refit at BAE Systems Ship Repair Hawaii in Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard’s drydock. It included the unprecedented step of installing scrubbers on four of the six engines in April, given that Pride of America sails its entire itinerary within the North American Emissions Control Area (ECA). Work began during drydock and will continue throughout the year. The operator’s chief executive officer Kevin Sheehan told PST: “We will have an army of people working on it for four to five months and then put it into operation.”
The vessel “is one of our marquee ships and we want to make sure it is best in class,” Mr Sheehan said, adding that the US$30 million does not include the revenue lost by taking the ship out of the market for two weeks.
‘Best in class’ is a bit of a misnomer for this US-flag vessel, which sails out of Hawaii all year round. It is a one-off and, since Norwegian Cruise Line (Norwegian) reduced the vessels which sail from Hawaii from three to one, the operation now pays dividends.
Mr Sheehan described the project, which was implemented before he took
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over at the helm: “Hawaii was a fantastic idea but executed poorly. We didn’t do our research properly.” Having to employ American crew (due to it being a US-flag ship) was a completely different ballgame for the company. “We didn’t understand the American crew and that was the crippling start of the business. Taking two ships out of the market was the best thing that could have been done. There was way too much supply and not enough demand at the right prices: we had to charge high prices because of the [higher cost of the] American crew,” he said.
American crew earn different salaries, work different hours and are paid subject to tax, unlike crew on other ships on the fleet. In late 2006, the company was granted the ability to employ 25 per cent international crew “which helped a lot” with service standards even though in these circumstances they are subject to the same salary, taxes and hours. In the early days, crew turnover was huge, with new employees being trained in Maryland, arriving in Hawaii and after a few days deciding it was not for them. This meant that the company was not able to “execute product offering in a very, very competitive market,” Mr Sheehan said. That has now all been turned around with Norwegian receiving “record guest satisfaction scores today” as well as good yields. “Now people are seeing what a great product it is, after terrible service in the past,” he added.
To maintain these levels and continue to deliver a quality product, Pride of America has been given a serious interior makeover with the design coming from Norwegian’s in-house team together with Tillberg Design.
Mr Sheehan commented that the interior renovations had been made to “all the things that make it look like a new ship again.” These included the addition of 24 luxury suites, four studio staterooms and four inside staterooms; flatscreen televisions in all cabins; shipwide WiFi; an upgraded fitness centre; new carpeting and
Sheehan: the scrubber installations “made an awful lot of sense”
directional signage and updated décor. As for the decision to fit scrubbers, he explained, the cruise operator is
Passenger Ship Technology I 2nd Quarter 2013 I 77
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