chengkp75

There is typically a mobility challenged muster station, that will have a nurse in attendance, and crew assigned to get the disabled to the boats. There will typically also be crew assigned to go find the disabled (if they are known to the ship), and bring them to the muster, using a hand carry if needed for stairs, or using the elevators (which are not "disabled" as most think, but placed in "firefighter mode" which disables the call buttons at each deck, and the elevator is controlled only in the cab.

I think the USCG and CBP would disagree that their autonomy is semantics, even though they fall under the same Cabinet Department. That would be like saying that the Army and Navy are the same, since they fall under Defense. And, I really think the Marines would disagree.

It has been reported in the last many years' SEC filings that Carnival Corp does not buy fuel futures.

Fortunately, passengers don't vote for SOLAS amendments. And the agencies that do, are not particularly swayed by public opinion. And, most of those agencies are not from countries with large cruise passenger populations.

While you may not consider them "boilers", there is a heat exchanger that takes the secondary water system water, and boils it, using the heated primary water loop, and the steam then powers a turbine. So, a gas turbine, for the same power output, would be much smaller than the steam turbine, the secondary water loop, the heat exchanger (boiler), and the reactor system. This is established fact. And, while the gas turbine holds a size advantage over diesel, diesel still holds a size advantage over steam. I would suspect that a nuclear powered cruise ship would still use a turbo-electric propulsion system. Steam turbines are notoriously slow in response to astern bells, and suck up enormous volumes of steam to get any power at all from them. It also needs to be stopped to reverse. Electric propulsion with SCR controlled speed is almost instantaneous in response, and a controllable pitch propeller can go almost directly from full ahead to full astern in seconds. Steam turbines are slightly more efficient when going ahead, but dreadful when maneuvering. There is a reason that the US merchant marine retained steam turbine propulsion after WW2 when the rest of the world converted to diesel, cheap fuel. When fuel wasn't cheap anymore, after the Oil Embargo in the 70's, the US dumped steam like a hot potato, and converted to diesel. Today, virtually the only steam ships operating are the LNG tankers, that use the boil off of cargo as fuel.

No. Port facilities are under the jurisdiction of the USCG, as the "Port State Control" agency. Both the ships and the port have to have ISPS (International Ship and Port Security) plans, that meet international standards, and that the USCG oversee. The terminal security is private, hired by the port. TSA does, however, act in an advisory role to USCG in implementing the ISPS requirements, and for training purposes. TSA also assists the USCG in port security by issuing the TWIC (Transportation Workers Identification Credential), which all mariners or contractors (truck drivers, cab drivers, ship's agents, port chaplains, vendors) require to be allowed free access to port facilities. The TWIC program is like the TSA-Pre Check, though the TWIC requires a full FBI background check.

First off, TSA has nothing to do with cruise ships or their manifests. As for when the passenger manifest is turned in to CBP, that is 90 minutes prior to sailing. For most lines, prior to covid, you could book within about 24 hours of sailing, some up to the afternoon before.

While you are correct that debt service is a large portion of the corporate balance sheet, bunker fuel is about 15% of operating costs, and the largest single line item, per ship.

Any first responder organization or training facility will tell you the same. So, I guess you don't put much faith in airline pilots, firefighters, police, or even armed forces. What those same organizations will tell you, is that the more you train, and the more realistic the training, the more "muscle memory" will take over from conscious thought and you will respond as you have trained. Will the crew act perfectly in an emergency? Likely not, but they will do a far better job of saving your life than you or all the thousands of passengers would. I, too, find your attitude, or at least your statement, to be demeaning to those who take training for the sole reason to save your life. Training is difficult, and many times dangerous to the crew.

No.

Sorry, brain fart, was thinking Portland dry dock. Don't know why.

They must have really upgraded the propulsion system to make that time table. 9100 miles in 5 days.

From the first post, it appeared to me (and the other poster as well), that you were talking about a one-way cruise from Florida to either NYC or NOLA. Now that the actual itineraries are shown, it becomes legal. But, not sure these cruises with limited US ports is what the OP is looking for, though we may never know.

And, you'd be wrong. US bunker barges, unlike those elsewhere around the world, require the ship to connect the hose (stick the nozzle in the filler) on the ship side, and to control when to stop fueling. Both ship and bunker barge share responsibility for the safe transfer of fuel. Pretty much responsibility changes at the side of the receiving vessel.

The Delaware requires near constant dredging. The Trainer and Marcus Hook refineries that I mentioned, just below Philadelphia, were dredging nearly every year, to keep the depth from filling up with silt from upriver. The "controlling depth" or minimum depth the channel is maintained to, has been 40 feet (12.2 meters) for years, and is now about about 80% dredged to 45 feet (13.7 meters). So, the dredging has nothing to do with getting cruise ships to Philadelphia, it has to do with bridges, length of the river transit, and demographics, when you already have existing cruise ports in NYC and Baltimore.

I don't remember the Delaware being one way, even back when I was bringing large container and RO/RO ships in there (80's). The pilots do, however, limit some transits for deep vessels to riding the peak of the flood tide, more to get speed than to clear the bottom.

I never understand why folks think that cruise ships have this large draft. Even Oasis of the Seas has a draft of 9.3 meters, while the small tanker I built in Philly, and which called at the Trainer and Marcus Hook refineries many times has a loaded draft of over 11.5 meters. Small to medium cruise ships could easily sail up to Philadelphia were it not for the bridges.

Back in the '70's, I pushed barges up the Miss from NOLA to Cairo, Ill. As you say, shifting sand bars moved all the time, and fall was always low water times.

The distance between Nassau and Cococay is 64 miles, which is 3.5 hours steaming at full speed. But, coming from the Atlantic to either Nassau or Cococay, you would use the channel south of Great Abaco island, and you would steam right by Nassau on your way to Cococay, so you would arrive 3.5 hours later at Cococay, and have to leave at dinner time to make arrival in PC.

While they may not announce these things, a look at the ticket contract for the Mississippi cruises (haven't compared to European contract) shows that they warn about just about everything that could happen before, during, and after the cruise. They even include a clause that waives "in rem" torts against the ship (used to "arrest" the ship). It's quite a document, and far wordier than the mainstream cruise lines' contracts. https://docs.vikingcruises.com/pdf/3-210419_PassengerTicketContractMSP-US.pdf

In your first quote, you appear to acknowledge that Baltimore could not handle the Anthem, then you ask why only small ships sail there. There is a small thing called "bridges". Perhaps you've heard of them, there are two quite famous ones in London. Philadelphia has the same problem, and it costs a lot of time (speeds are restricted in rivers), money (longer times in ECA's where the fuel required to be burned is more expensive), and time (longer to get to the next port), when you have to sail down the Delaware River for 8 hours. But, bridges are the top issue, these limit the height of ships able to sail past them. Grandeur of the Seas sailed out of Baltimore for years (since 2013), and Enchantment did before her. At present, Vision and Enchantment are sailing out of Baltimore, both are in the same class as Grandeur.

While Boston would be closer to the route, it would require a more northerly route, and that would, a: take you further from the Azores, so probably canceling that port, and b: weather would be colder and possibly rougher in May. By "DC" I assume you mean Baltimore, since DC is not a port city, but again, this is south of NYC, so that adds distance to the cruise. Yes, that is the "southern route" from NYC to Europe. Huh? Yes, it would go the same route both ways, why would you expect a different route? Sorry, that poster forgot the tongue in cheek emoji, they were showing the ridiculousness of the OP's question.

Well, let's see. Cococay is over a thousand miles out of the way for NYC to Le Havre. Both Anthem and QM2 take a rhumb line course from NYC, and that only requires a diversion of a couple hundred miles, along the route. Look at a map sometime, Ace.

Not really. More passengers means a bigger ship, which means more power to push it along, which means more fuel. The economies of scale found in the larger ships are mainly in capital costs at construction and things like fewer higher paid crew (one Captain instead of two).

Carnival Corp brands do not use fuel futures contracts, and haven't for years. However, there is no direct correlation between crude oil price and bunker fuel price, unlike gasoline. Since bunker fuel is a byproduct of the refining process, price increases in bunkers tend to lag behind crude.