Symphony of the Seas - Update from onboard

[livingonthebeach]

1 minute ago, Pratique said:

Yeah I don't assume on the internet but sometimes you can tell.

 

Quite right Professor! (mean that affectionally!)

[livingonthebeach]

3 minutes ago, Pratique said:

Yeah I don't assume on the internet but sometimes you can tell.

 

I think we were talking about those long forgotten lawsuits.

 

Yes -- quite right!  We were all saying those lawsuits would not go far and they didn't -- thanks for all your input during lockdown. Turned out you were on point and predicted the outcome!!! 

[CPT Trips]

15 minutes ago, RoyalC said:

EZ call we saw coming- We all knew the numbers are understated and and they are running out of crew and ports. DeSantis couldn't hardly talk the other day. Everyone is getting it.

I’ll take any small blessing. Sadly, there’s still written communication. 

[CPT Trips]

4 hours ago, John&LaLa said:

 

Do they need another quarantine ship?

 

1 hour ago, John&LaLa said:

 

Absolutely ingenious, but it's also following CDC guidelines. I wish them well.

 

Of course there's a certain group that call them Plague Ships and its only being done to save money. Oh well,  😥 

Riddle me this . . . what’s the difference between a quarantine ship and a plague ship in these times of Covid. 

[Biker19]

Just now, CPT Trips said:

what’s the difference between a quarantine ship and a plague ship in these times of Covid. 

RCI is getting some money on one of them. 

[livingonthebeach]

3 minutes ago, CPT Trips said:

 

Riddle me this . . . what’s the difference between a quarantine ship and a plague ship in these times of Covid. 

 

Just a question of semantics -- that's all. If I had to choose would pick the quarantine ship over the plague ship -- sounds better LOL!

[Teknodude]

Just chiming in again.

 
From a crew perspective, many of crew were hating the current situation - such as the horrible Xmas cruise experience etc. 

 

Not being able to provide the experience guests expect was totally wrecking morale on board for crew and a lot were calling on RCI to call a time out. 
 

Crew were going down with covid, venues shutting, crew themselves living under draconian rules leading to crew morale plummeting, and the existing situation just couldn’t continue. 
 

I’m sure there are hundreds of disappointed customers out there, but RCI literally tried to run too quickly before they could walk, and have found out the hard way that right now it just wasn’t working with packed ships, and lack of crew.  
 

I’m in no way a RCI apologist - just totally support my partner who is suffering from the way these cruises have been run recently, and I think a time out was necessary so the company can regroup and get their ***** and protocols together and run (no pun intended) a tighter ship. 
 

Just my thoughts from someone indirectly affected by having a partner working on board Symphony. 

[CalTexCruiser]

5 minutes ago, Teknodude said:

Just chiming in again.

 
From a crew perspective, many of crew were hating the current situation - such as the horrible Xmas cruise experience etc. 

 

Not being able to provide the experience guests expect was totally wrecking morale on board for crew and a lot were calling on RCI to call a time out. 
 

Crew were going down with covid, venues shutting, crew themselves living under draconian rules leading to crew morale plummeting, and the existing situation just couldn’t continue. 
 

I’m sure there are hundreds of disappointed customers out there, but RCI literally tried to run too quickly before they could walk, and have found out the hard way that right now it just wasn’t working with packed ships, and lack of crew.  
 

I’m in no way a RCI apologist - just totally support my partner who is suffering from the way these cruises have been run recently, and I think a time out was necessary so the company can regroup and get their ***** and protocols together and run (no pun intended) a tighter ship. 
 

Just my thoughts from someone indirectly affected by having a partner working on board Symphony. 

 

Thanks for your behind the scenes insight.  I think the timeout is definitely the right call.

 

What I find interesting is that RCI seems to be significantly harder hit than the related company Celebrity.  I wonder if the protocols for crew are different between RCI and Celebrity.

 

Although Celebrity has experienced positive cases among their crew, they are not seeing the huge numbers that are on RCI ships.

[RoyalC]

6 minutes ago, Teknodude said:

Just chiming in again.

 
From a crew perspective, many of crew were hating the current situation - such as the horrible Xmas cruise experience etc. 

 

Not being able to provide the experience guests expect was totally wrecking morale on board for crew and a lot were calling on RCI to call a time out. 
 

Crew were going down with covid, venues shutting, crew themselves living under draconian rules leading to crew morale plummeting, and the existing situation just couldn’t continue. 
 

I’m sure there are hundreds of disappointed customers out there, but RCI literally tried to run too quickly before they could walk, and have found out the hard way that right now it just wasn’t working with packed ships, and lack of crew.  
 

I’m in no way a RCI apologist - just totally support my partner who is suffering from the way these cruises have been run recently, and I think a time out was necessary so the company can regroup and get their ***** and protocols together and run (no pun intended) a tighter ship. 
 

Just my thoughts from someone indirectly affected by having a partner working on board Symphony. 

Any report on the range of symptoms they are experiencing? Are they testing for variants?

[RFerrington]

6 minutes ago, Teknodude said:

Just chiming in again.

 
From a crew perspective, many of crew were hating the current situation - such as the horrible Xmas cruise experience etc. 

 

Not being able to provide the experience guests expect was totally wrecking morale on board for crew and a lot were calling on RCI to call a time out. 
 

Crew were going down with covid, venues shutting, crew themselves living under draconian rules leading to crew morale plummeting, and the existing situation just couldn’t continue. 
 

I’m sure there are hundreds of disappointed customers out there, but RCI literally tried to run too quickly before they could walk, and have found out the hard way that right now it just wasn’t working with packed ships, and lack of crew.  
 

I’m in no way a RCI apologist - just totally support my partner who is suffering from the way these cruises have been run recently, and I think a time out was necessary so the company can regroup and get their ***** and protocols together and run (no pun intended) a tighter ship. 
 

Just my thoughts from someone indirectly affected by having a partner working on board Symphony. 

If you cannot answer this question I completely understand.  Are the crew coming down with COVID multiple times (more than once) ?

[John&LaLa]

32 minutes ago, CPT Trips said:

 

Riddle me this . . . what’s the difference between a quarantine ship and a plague ship in these times of Covid. 

 

Plague ship is just a disparaging cheap shot.

[John&LaLa]

21 minutes ago, CalTexCruiser said:

 

Thanks for your behind the scenes insight.  I think the timeout is definitely the right call.

 

What I find interesting is that RCI seems to be significantly harder hit than the related company Celebrity.  I wonder if the protocols for crew are different between RCI and Celebrity.

 

Although Celebrity has experienced positive cases among their crew, they are not seeing the huge numbers that are on RCI ships.

 

Celebrity doesn't allow unvaxed children

[RoyalC]

50 minutes ago, CPT Trips said:

 

Riddle me this . . . what’s the difference between a quarantine ship and a plague ship in these times of Covid. 

Plague is bacterial and covid is viral

[MommaBear55]

1 hour ago, Pratique said:

I should do the he/she/it pronoun thing that is becoming all the rage these days.

I want to be the Queen, so "we" should cover it 

[Cruising89143]

34 minutes ago, CalTexCruiser said:

 

Thanks for your behind the scenes insight.  I think the timeout is definitely the right call.

 

What I find interesting is that RCI seems to be significantly harder hit than the related company Celebrity.  I wonder if the protocols for crew are different between RCI and Celebrity.

 

Although Celebrity has experienced positive cases among their crew, they are not seeing the huge numbers that are on RCI ships.

Celebrity requires children twelve and older to be vaccinated. I think the difference in policy is that X is sailing with at least 95% of cruisers being vaccinated. Far less kids on board X. Celebrity is also having their issues as well. The Apex was turned away from Nassau today due to high Covid numbers. Also reading about issues on the Edge as well.

 

For cruises departing US homeports, any guest 12 years of age or older on boarding day must be fully vaccinated to sail. If your child’s 12^th birthday occurs too close to boarding day, not allowing enough time for full vaccination, we can move your cruise date to allow you more time or you may choose to cancel your reservation for a full refund. Our port agreements expect that every vaccine-eligible guest onboard is fully vaccinated, therefore exceptions cannot be made. However, if your child is 11 and turns 12 on Day 2 of the cruise or later, your 11 years old will be allowed to board the ship on embarkation day as long as they complete all COVID-19 testing requirements for unvaccinated children.  

[nocl]

17 minutes ago, John&LaLa said:

 

Celebrity doesn't allow unvaxed children

Celebrity also seems to have lower occupancy numbers

[Teknodude]

48 minutes ago, RoyalC said:

Any report on the range of symptoms they are experiencing? Are they testing for variants?

I can again only quote my other half but he said that omicron was detected amongst the crew. His words. Not official. 

[Teknodude]

48 minutes ago, RFerrington said:

If you cannot answer this question I completely understand.  Are the crew coming down with COVID multiple times (more than once) ?

I don’t know the answer. My other half had covid during the first wave a year ago. 
He is tested multiple times. Negative. (He is triple vax) 

[Teknodude]

I’ll reiterate this about the crew.
 

The crew are working under very difficult personal circumstances.

 
All crew social areas shut. 
Crew must go from work station to their cabin. Only detour is canteen to eat

. 
You can only eat alone or with someone from your immediate work environment - same office / team etc. 

Any co mingling or rule breaking will be met with immediate removal from the vessel. 
 

It’s tough for the crew too. Just remember they are working in trying circumstances - which hasn’t lent itself to giving guests a positive experience. 
 

hence why I think the reset was necessary.

[Teknodude]

57 minutes ago, CalTexCruiser said:

 

Thanks for your behind the scenes insight.  I think the timeout is definitely the right call.

 

What I find interesting is that RCI seems to be significantly harder hit than the related company Celebrity.  I wonder if the protocols for crew are different between RCI and Celebrity.

 

Although Celebrity has experienced positive cases among their crew, they are not seeing the huge numbers that are on RCI ships.

As a personal opinion - RCI seemed intent on packing its ships - especially premium cruises Xmas new year full of high priced guests to basically recoup some of their disastrous bottom line.
And let’s see what we can get away with. Keep filling the ships more and more until basically capacity. 
 

and it’s come back to proper bite them hard on the ass. 
 

the crew have been calling for this reset for weeks and weeks. And HQ in Miami just would not listen to them. 
 

it’s all on HQ in Miami. Vent your anger at them. 

[cruisingguy007]

1 hour ago, livingonthebeach said:

 

Just a question of semantics -- that's all. If I had to choose would pick the quarantine ship over the plague ship -- sounds better LOL!

 

Nah, I'd take the plauge ship! Sounds more fun. I imagine it somthing like that Canadian flight to Mexico that is all over the news. A bunch of covid positive folks partying on down (might as well if everyone has covid already) and being rebels with a party cause lol. Quarantine ship sounds boring and sad. 

[Virtopia]

17 minutes ago, Teknodude said:

I’ll reiterate this about the crew.
 

The crew are working under very difficult personal circumstances.

 
All crew social areas shut. 
Crew must go from work station to their cabin. Only detour is canteen to eat

. 
You can only eat alone or with someone from your immediate work environment - same office / team etc. 

Any co mingling or rule breaking will be met with immediate removal from the vessel. 
 

It’s tough for the crew too. Just remember they are working in trying circumstances - which hasn’t lent itself to giving guests a positive experience. 
 

hence why I think the reset was necessary.

 

I can only imagine how difficult this would be. From all the staff I've talked to, they really enjoy the social time they get with each other when off shift so that definitely changes their mindset.

[Cruising89143]

27 minutes ago, Teknodude said:

I’ll reiterate this about the crew.
 

The crew are working under very difficult personal circumstances.

 
All crew social areas shut. 
Crew must go from work station to their cabin. Only detour is canteen to eat

. 
You can only eat alone or with someone from your immediate work environment - same office / team etc. 

Any co mingling or rule breaking will be met with immediate removal from the vessel. 
 

It’s tough for the crew too. Just remember they are working in trying circumstances - which hasn’t lent itself to giving guests a positive experience. 
 

hence why I think the reset was necessary.

I think most of us forget about the crew in situations like this. It’s been my experience that they work very hard and try to make sure that guests have a great time. 
 

I think that we’re witnessing the “perfect storm”. Omicron and the holidays. Not just cruise ships even though that’s front and center on this board. It will be interesting to see how the cruise lines continue to react to this latest issue. Personally, I think we will see more ships go idle until they can get a handle on things. It’s sad all the way around. Thanks for telling another side of the story. 

[Eddie Wilson]

2 minutes ago, cruisingator2 said:

I think that we’re witnessing the “perfect storm”. Omicron and the holidays.

Personally, I think we will see more ships go idle until they can get a handle on things.

 

Since all the other ships experienced the same holiday cruises, and possibly some of the off duty conditions, I would guess the low morale could be present in other ships.

 

We we will definitely find out within the next few days, it would not surprise me if a couple other ships time out for a short period.  

 

I imagine the HQ of RCL is working the lines with every ship this weekend. 

 

Eddie

[Jimbo]

1 hour ago, Teknodude said:

As a personal opinion - RCI seemed intent on packing its ships - especially premium cruises Xmas new year full of high priced guests to basically recoup some of their disastrous bottom line.
And let’s see what we can get away with. Keep filling the ships more and more until basically capacity. 
 

and it’s come back to proper bite them hard on the ass. 
 

the crew have been calling for this reset for weeks and weeks. And HQ in Miami just would not listen to them. 
 

it’s all on HQ in Miami. Vent your anger at them. 

Just moving much to fast, just trying to recoup some of the lost money much to fast under the current conditions. You would have thought since they had so much time to think this over they would have had a better plan on the restart.

 

Makes you wonder doesn't if Richard Fain wasn't agreeable about how fast things were going and if this was the reason he is leaving because he didn't agree what was going on.

 

Makes you wonder?