Technical issues on Caribbean Princess

The December Panama Canal cruise passengers were just notified of technical problems. Vague explanation and one port change with other port time changes. How can we find out the real problem?

Nobody knows the real problem.

I am fairly certain they do not. Cruise ships have not used Cristobal since about 2011 when they removed the warehouse portion of the pier where the shops were located.

Never saw shops there, just tables.

Never saw shops there, just tables.

There were plenty of tables, particularly with the Embara Indians and other vendors with the hats, tagua nuts and other local souvenirs. There were several eateries/watering holes as well a linen shop, liquor store. Since it was all within the covered portion of the pier there were just usually facades with a drop ceiling for those that were air conditioned. One area the had the store fronts configured to create a small village square where they presented some folkloric dances.

We are on the Jan 3 Panama Canal cruise so guess we'll see a change on that itinerary also. If they change Ocho Rios to Grand Cayman that's ok with me. I would have liked to keep the Colon stop though. Did the $50 pp obc get offered with the latest change?

Anyone know what's worthwhile for a port visit to Cartagena?

We are on the Jan 3 Panama Canal cruise so guess we'll see a change on that itinerary also. If they change Ocho Rios to Grand Cayman that's ok with me. I would have liked to keep the Colon stop though. Did the $50 pp obc get offered with the latest change?

 

Anyone know what's worthwhile for a port visit to Cartagena?

We're on this with you. We'll be on a Princess excursion to go all the way through the locks to the pacific and meet the ship back Colon (I guess it will probably be Cristobal now). Have a day pass to a nice resort in Ocho Rios so I hope we keep it. We're taking a city tour in cartagena.

You are right on the money with this. See my post that I did for the Roll Call pertaining to this voyage pasted below here:

 

Sorry to hear all the quick negative reactions to the itinerary changes. As reported, the problem is technical not power related. The effect is not being able to achieve full speed and the itinerary changes result in obtaining two more full days under way to arrive in Port Everglades at it's scheduled time.

 

We are also disappointed in not being able to visit Rotterdam, Vigo and the Azores. They were partly the reason we booked that voyage and it obviously matched up with our already booked Caribbean Tour voyage on the CB to make a BTB.

 

My feeling upon reading the announcement was that there was no way Princess would compromise the safety of its passengers by putting them on a ship that wasn't seaworthy. I wanted to make sure there was a plan to fix the issue knowing that there wasn't any indication that the ship was going into a repair dock since the next voyage hadn't been altered.

My wife and I are fortunate to have a close contact at the upper level of Princess. I took the opportunity to send an email early yesterday and received a phone call back almost immediately letting us know a response from Princess regarding the situation is being readied and should be out next week.

 

The bottom line is that we are staying the course and will review the response when it appears. I would agree that just offering the $100 OBC and no apparent reduction in PF&T seeing we are losing about two port days is not a great deal - more like no deal. However, with doing 31 voyages with Princess we are in the "loyal" group and as a stockholder along with being a stakeholder, I'll give them the benefit of a response that makes sense before we "jump ship".

I received an email on August 12th regarding technical problems affecting speed and itinerary changes. Did you ever get a more definitive response from Princess? All the information I received was that an engine was not working but the ship could operate anyway. Have you received any more information? Thank you.

Has there been any definitive information on the technical problems on Caribbean Princess? I have a cruise scheduled for December and received the email about the lack of speed, port and itinerary changes? I would like more specifics in order to make a decision about continuing on this cruise ship. Many thanks.

I don't have a FB account but I've been told that Princess is very responsive to questions asked there. Has anybody (recently) asked about this issue on FB?

We are on the Jan 3 Panama Canal cruise so guess we'll see a change on that itinerary also. If they change Ocho Rios to Grand Cayman that's ok with me. I would have liked to keep the Colon stop though. Did the $50 pp obc get offered with the latest change?

 

Anyone know what's worthwhile for a port visit to Cartagena?

If the tour of the Monastery is still offered, it was an amazing tour! Many places to see!

We are booked on the Jan. 3 Panama Canal cruise as well. I would be happy if they changed the itinerary to include Grand Cayman instead of Ocho Rios.

I don't have a FB account but I've been told that Princess is very responsive to questions asked there. Has anybody (recently) asked about this issue on FB?

Thank you. I will check today.

If the problem is with the speed the ship can sail, it is not too significant as we traveled on this ship earlier this month and we made an average speed of 18.9 knots one night. That is only 3 or 4 knots under the rated speed for that ship.

If the problem is with the speed the ship can sail, it is not too significant as we traveled on this ship earlier this month and we made an average speed of 18.9 knots one night. That is only 3 or 4 knots under the rated speed for that ship.

This is accurate. What I posted previously is that all engines are operational. The problem is with one propulsion system that won't produce full speed, but rather 2 or 3 knots less than that. It's not good practice to run some at full speed and others less than that which causes imbalance and vibration. So, they run the "good" systems at a speed to match the one that has a problem.

The net result is that operationally the vessel is running at a lower than originally planned thus making the times between ports or waypoints longer. To accommodate the planned itinerary they had to remove a couple of ports and others that were better fitted geographically so the ship could run a few knots slower.

As mentioned, this in no way puts the ship in an unsafe operating condition and is capable of providing whatever is needed to keep the passengers, crew, and ship safe.

Anybody on the October 21 Panama cruise?

Anybody on the October 21 Panama cruise?

There is a roll call for this sailing.

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Ops! Sorry.

Ops! Sorry.

No worries! I'm subscribed to both Roll Calls. This one, which is more about technical issues of the Caribbean Princess, and the Roll Call specifically for the October 21 cruise.

That Roll Call is titled "October 21, 2017 - Panama Canal & Caribbean".

Enjoy!

Derrick

This is accurate. What I posted previously is that all engines are operational. The problem is with one propulsion system that won't produce full speed, but rather 2 or 3 knots less than that. It's not good practice to run some at full speed and others less than that which causes imbalance and vibration. So, they run the "good" systems at a speed to match the one that has a problem.

 

The net result is that operationally the vessel is running at a lower than originally planned thus making the times between ports or waypoints longer. To accommodate the planned itinerary they had to remove a couple of ports and others that were better fitted geographically so the ship could run a few knots slower.

As mentioned, this in no way puts the ship in an unsafe operating condition and is capable of providing whatever is needed to keep the passengers, crew, and ship safe.

HI I just looked at your beautiful photos. Do you carry a lot of equipment with you on cruises. And do you take cruises mainly to photograph the ports of call?

HI I just looked at your beautiful photos. Do you carry a lot of equipment with you on cruises. And do you take cruises mainly to photograph the ports of call?

Wow! Thanks for the compliment. Don't get a lot of those on CC. Regarding the equipment we carry, it has gotten less and less every voyage as we learn what we don't need. What we do carry now are two Nikon DLSR's, a D7000 and D750. We only take one lens for each and it's the same one, an 18-200 zoom because it covers all the shots we need. Lots of memory cards, lens cleaning stuff, extra batteries for the cameras, portable external hard drive to download the memory cards after each day for insurance sake and that's about it.

We take cruises because we love cruising. Photography is our hobby so we do take our cameras with us at each port. After over 30 voyages, and most to the same ports, we tend now to do more street photography and try to get images of things that most people don't see. One those port calls we only take the camera, spare battery, Lenspen and on other SD card and that's it.

We have been fortunate to have Princess select 3 of our images to be on the Royal and Regal Princess. There were 65,000 entries and Princess was only going to use 1,000 on each ship and we have 3.

Grego, congrats on your pics being selected. That is a great honor and will be a lasting memory.

So which is your fav ship? I am assuming either Royal or Regal because of the size and more open spaces

The thing that really bothered me was we were told the Carribean Princess would be repaired when it returned to Florida on Oct. 7. But a few weeks ago another person posted that their cruise which starts on Oct. 21 already had itenerary changes for the same reason! Apparantly they are not repairing the problem!!

When did Princess say it was going to be repaired on October 7?

The thing that really bothered me was we were told the Carribean Princess would be repaired when it returned to Florida on Oct. 7. But a few weeks ago another person posted that their cruise which starts on Oct. 21 already had itenerary changes for the same reason! Apparantly they are not repairing the problem!!

Panama Canal cruise leaving on Nov 10 and we have been notified of one port change and shortened times at a couple of others. So it doesn't look like any repairs before Late Nov.

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Grego, congrats on your pics being selected. That is a great honor and will be a lasting memory.

So which is your fav ship? I am assuming either Royal or Regal because of the size and more open spaces

We do love the Royal Class ships because of the Horizon Court/Bistro layout, Alfredo's, the Piazza, the walking/jogging track on deck 18, and the overall beauty of the ship. However, the Princess ships are like our children in that we love them all and would never, never, never admit we love one more than the other.

When did Princess say it was going to be repaired on October 7?

Told by Princess in one of the numerous phone calls regarding our transatlantic trip that eliminated 3 ports, they said the problem would be fixed when it returned to Florida at end of our trip Oct. 7. thats why I was surprised to see in June that they had already changed itenerary for someones Oct. 21 sailing. We cancelled the Sept. 22 trip, rebooked Panama on the 27th on Coral Princess