Epic still in Port- Wifi turned off, don't seem to be going anywhere

[somethingclever]

We boarded the Epic today and should have left at 7pm. It is now almost 10pm and we haven't left. At first we were told we were switching Monday and Saturdays ports to make up for the late departure but when I texted a friend in St Thomas to tell him, he sent back a notice that St Thomas had received that said the NCL Epic was not allowed to disembark due to more than 1% covid positivity on board. Now we are seriously wondering if we are leaving at all. 
Something is up. They've turned the Wifi off and our waiter at dinner told us not to worry about the muster drill bc a new announcement was coming in the morning? Does anyone know anything. It's very frustrating to be on board and be kept in the dark.

[CarolinaMamma]

Wow! Hope you sail soon. Keep us posted. 

[TNcruising02]

That's strange that they turned off the wifi.  It would be very frustrating not knowing why there is a delay.

[rnfulk]

I'm on the Encore in a week and have been stalking the webcam. Tonight it left Miami about 3.5 hours behind schedule. My assumption (or hope) is that the delays for embarkation could be caused by time needed for bag retrieval for those who tested positive at the pier. 

Hopefully it isn't anything more serious. I think if I manage to stay covid free, I still might give myself an ulcer by the end of this week. Such stressful times for travel...

[jkneern]

We were on Epic Dec5 sailing and the internet didn’t work then. Internal issues and sounds like it hasn’t been fixed yet.

 

[Lab mouse]

On board wifi package might not work while ship is still in port? Also, if any consolation, my family and I were on the last Epic sailing of March 2020. I recall that the ship was still exiting the harbor at a snail's pace well into the evening when we left San Juan. Hang in there! We're booked on the Epic for Jan 2 - 9.

[www3traveler]

Epic is underway now.  Just about the same time She left last week.  My friend who was on board said late arriving passengers was the reason.  Given all the flight cancellations the last few days and weather issues in some places, still might be the reason for a late departure.

[hallux]

21 minutes ago, Lab mouse said:

On board wifi package might not work while ship is still in port?

No.  One of the 'tricks' to get dinner reservations on embarkation day is to connect to the ship's WiFi while still waiting in the terminal, so you can get to the ship's servers to make the reservations you want.

[ChiefMateJRK]

If you're still in port, why not just step out on deck and use cellular data? 🤓

[CiaraMissed]

I was on Epic last week, we departed at around 11, due to 50-60+ passengers who had a late arrival from Montreal. Per current NCL guidelines, late arriving passengers cannot join the ship in a later port. Given only about 1700 passengers in total, seems like NCL did the math and determined that waiting was worth it to get 3% of passengers on board.