The Unloved Boats: 8 Abandoned Cruise Ships & Liners

Table Of Content

• Data Bankruptcy to sell the last asset of the former operator Pullmantur Cruises
• Eerie photos show empty cruise ships moored off coasts around the world as the coronavirus floors the industry
• Carnival Imagination
• Pullmantur Horizon cruise ship to be scrapped at Turkey's Aliaga Shipbreaking Yard
• Lifebook: Single Device that Combines Every Gadget

Kiwie’s work was augmented and complemented by a wealth of “bright and surreal” graffiti by acclaimed artists including Dale Grimshaw, Dan Kitchener, Snub23, Spacehop, and Fin DAC. The latter’s eye-popping “Mauricamai” covers most the Duke’s stern and has been breathtakingly captured above by Flickr user Mike. However, the ship could not be recovered mainly because the Solomon Islands were undergoing a violent civil war at the time of its sinking.

Data Bankruptcy to sell the last asset of the former operator Pullmantur Cruises

All the kids ooed and awed at my cool roller-skates that I bought all the way from home. The rink was fairly small and we simply went around and around the track multiple times in circles. While the ocean views were amazing, it was pretty lame compared to other activities onboard. In fact, I brought my own roller-skates on a cruise ship once so I could comfortably partake in the activity. I wasn’t sure if the cruise line provided skates for me to use, so I convinced my parents that I needed to bring my own (along with ice skates to use on the ice skating rink). Because the nightclub space wasn’t utilized during the day, cruise lines now use a lounge or other space onboard each night to serve as a nightclub.

Eerie photos show empty cruise ships moored off coasts around the world as the coronavirus floors the industry

Many urban explorers, adventurists, and photographers explored and photographed the ship’s uniquely preserved interior. In fact, when a salvage attempt was made in late 2000, a local tribe shot arrows at the salvage crew. Although you might still find ice sculptures on display when you cruise today, you surely would have seen multiple ice sculptures and even demonstrations during cruises in the previous decades. "On all the trips we've done, we have a round of applause when we arrive at Mudeford Quay." "Particulate matter and nitrogen oxide emissions, which can impact health of local populations, would be emitted closer to where people live and work, and therefore be more likely to impact the quality of the air they are breathing," he explains.

Carnival Imagination

The Mediterranean Sky started sailing in 1953 under her original name of MS City of York after being constructed at the Vickers Shipbuilding complex in the UK. The ship operated for Ellerman Lines, which eventually was sold off to other shipping companies until the cruise line’s name fully disappeared in 2004. Despite her storied past and reputation, it was decided that the QE2 should be sold to a Dubai-based investment company for $100 million. Following her final voyage to Dubai, which included thousands of passengers, the new owners could not decide what to do with the famous vessel. Of course, you can still smoke onboard a cruise ship, but only in designated smoking areas. You can no longer smoke in any public place and certainly not indoors unless you’re in a designated smoking lounge or in the casino.

Decommissioned and Abandoned Cruise Ships: What Happens When They Retire to the Cruise Ship Graveyard?

But it has been eclipsed over the years by far bigger, more modern vessels with more amenities. By comparison, Carnival's newest ship -- the 5,282-passenger Mardi Gras -- measures 181,808 tons. In many cases, the ships that cruise lines have shed from their fleets have been sent to scrapyards to be disassembled.

Most decommissioned cruise ships are taken for dismantling at a ship scrapping yard. After the cruise line has removed everything of value, the remaining hull of the ship is auctioned off and eventually sent to a scrap yard that can handle dismantling a vessel of that size. Like every other work of machinery in the world, cruise ships can’t run forever. “In other cases, they’re sold for scrap—meaning the ship will dock at a shipyard and the most valuable parts will be sold piece-by-piece, and the rest of the ship stripped.” Cruise ships have a lot of interesting parts and features. There, five mammoth cruise ships sit crammed into a muddied cove, as hundreds of workers chip away at their hulls and bows, exposing the intricate anatomies of the boats that once carried thousands of people around the world.

Americans stranded by Norwegian Cruise save elderly passenger, family says: Ship 'left her to die' - Fox News

Americans stranded by Norwegian Cruise save elderly passenger, family says: Ship 'left her to die'.

Posted: Tue, 02 Apr 2024 07:00:00 GMT [source]

Lifebook: Single Device that Combines Every Gadget

One of the few/best-known exceptions is MS Costa Concordia, which by human error/stupidity ran aground and partially sunk in 2012 off Giglio Island, Italy. The vessel was refloated (at the staggering cost of ~EUR 225 million / ~USD 300 million) and dismantled in Genoa Italy. "They are stripped of all contents, then gradually cut down and dragged up the beach until the last keel plates are demolished," explained Knego, who features many photos of ships during the scrapping process on his website, Midship Century. "In Alang, there is a marketplace outside the yards where vendors offer up items like toilets, lights, paneling, furniture and navigation instruments for sale.

Costa Victoria

It costs $60,000 per month to dock and maintain the SS United States, and despite continued interest in redeveloping her, the conservancy group had to start looking at the possibility of scrapping the iconic ocean liner. Crystal Cruises even got close to purchasing the ship to transform her, but that eventually fell through. The ship was sold at auction to a scrapping company as part of the administration process.

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Because of that, it's a tactic that has not yet been adopted for cruise ships. Launched in 1956, the TSS Duke of Lancaster was built at the Belfast shipyards of Harland & Wolff where the RMS Titanic was constructed almost a half-century earlier. The 4,450 ton, 1,800 passenger steamer operated as a passenger ferry on the Heysham-Belfast route and as a cruise ship calling at a variety of European ports from Spain to Norway for the better part of two decades. In November of 1978, the venerable Duke was retired from service on the seas… a new, landlocked career was about to begin. While decommissioning a cruise ship is not the same thing as abandoning one, in some cases, a decommissioned ship can remain in a state of abandonment for many years before it is hauled to a suitable ship scrapping yard.

Sold to the Norwegian Caribbean Line, the France became the Norway, a cruise liner. Increasingly outdated in term of facilities, the ship was taken out of service for the second time in 2004 and sold for scrapping. It is the cost of maintaining ocean liners after they leave passenger service that usually dooms them. Symbols of national pride, it makes their eventual demise even harder to bear. Travel limits caused by the coronavirus in March saw the cruise industry freeze and clear their calendars for much of the year, leaving many empty liners laid up in ports or anchored out to sea, where they continue to drift listlessly.

Over the last decade, the cruising industry has been transformed through innovation and technology. But shore power is not yet available at many ports, including Southampton, meaning the ships would still need to use their own generators - even in port. Dr Smith says it would actually make little difference to green house gas emissions if ships docked in ports rather than anchored at sea, but the impact on air pollution would likely be greater. He said that is because of dangers of "anchor drag", or ships drifting at sea, due to severe weather.

As a late night activity, cruisers could head to the nightclubs and dance the night away with drinks and DJs. Activities that were once considered quintessential to cruising have been replaced. Cruise lines have to keep up with the trends to ensure their ships remain popular. The arrival of the UK's "ghost ships", as one Twitter user called them, has transformed the view from the coast and fascinated locals and tourists alike. They have now become a tourist attraction in their own right, with people paying to see them up close.

Three of the ships — Sun Princess, Sea Princess and Pacific Princess — were sold as part of an effort to cut costs during the coronavirus-caused global shutdown. Two others — Golden Princess and Star Princess — already had been scheduled to leave the Princess fleet even before the coronavirus pandemic began (though their departures were accelerated). As previously planned, Golden Princess and Star Princess were transferred to a Princess sister company, P&O Cruises Australia. The ship's new owner, a Chinese company, reportedly plans to turn the vessel into a floating hotel. The world's second-biggest cruise line by passenger capacity has shed four of its oldest ships over the past year.

It offers cruises that have a program centered on experiential learning and intercultural communication. Like Maasdam, Veendam also was sold to Seajets, the Greek/Cypriot ferry company. Like Carnival Fantasy and Carnival Fascination, it was one of Carnival's eight Fantasy Class ships. Unlike some of the others, it had been retrofitted over the years with extra balcony cabins. But that wasn't enough to keep it from the scrappers during the past year's downturn. Unlike more modern vessels, Carnival Fantasy lacks a large number of balcony cabins -- the type of cabins everyone wants these days.

At Alang, ships are either towed to the facility, which is located on the Gulf of Khambat, or sail there under their own power. When they arrive, vessels are run aground on the beach when the tide comes in. Shipbreakers -- the workers who dismantle the ships -- then use machinery to drag them further onto the sand and secure them. Many who explored the abandoned ship have described its interior as a time capsule due to its relatively pristine condition. Even glassware and bedding remain as she awaits her final voyage to a scrap yard.

With cruise ships having additional dining spots and food available nearly 24 hours at a time, the midnight budget is no longer needed for guests to get their late night snack. It’s hard to imagine this kind of abandoned activity could draw huge crowds; but, these days, cruise ships have so many activities onboard that surely these demonstrations just aren’t popular anymore to cruisers. In the 1960s, the cruising industry really started to emerge as a vacation destination rather than an ocean liner.