Faulty panels declared a fire hazard for 45 ships.

[BermudaBound2014]

“Paroc has identified 45 boats in operation with the faulty panels, including other types of ships run by other companies, the people said. Globally, there are fewer than 300 cruise ships in operation, according to the Cruise Lines International Association, an industry body which represents 95 per cent of the world’s ocean-going cruise capacity. The discovery comes as the cruise industry enters the crucial summer season, which will make or break cruise companies’ hopes….”

https://www.ft.com/content/8cfa4fdf-6d8d-486f-8be9-e14cafb36a43
 

 

Cruise Ship Delayed Over Fire Hazard, Others May Be Impacted”

https://cruiseradio.net/fire-hazard-delay-cruise-ship-delivery-impacted/

 

 

“Faulty Safety Materials May Put Dozens of Cruise Ships at Risk-Safety test failure of two types of fire insulating panels could impact as many as 45 ships from different lines.”

 

https://www.cruisehive.com/faulty-safety-materials-may-put-dozens-of-cruise-ships-at-risk/105929

 

 

[BermudaBound2014]

Important to note that CCL has only one ship effected.

 

No formal list has been released containing the 45 new builds effected.
 

In addition to MSC, RCL and NCL have both admitted to having ships involved in the recall. 
 

 

 

Edited July 9, 2023 by BermudaBound2014

[QuattroRomeo]

Well this is certainly another setback for cruise lines just as they are struggling to regain themselves. Safety issues have to be dealt with of course, but how unfortunate. The cruisehive article suggested Rotterdam "could" be one, based on the timing of the installations, so you just don't know how this will affect scheduling. Could be many ships pulled for sudden refits? Yikes!

[BermudaBound2014]

I'm not sure how much of a setback this is going to be. We just don't have all the facts yet. Obviously MSC and their new brand have taken on the brunt since they are refusing ship delivery. 

 

I always wonder about human psyche. If the list of 45 ships sailing is released, will people flock to cancel cruises on ships that failed fire inspection? Some may. I doubt all will.

 

Personally, I would avoid booking a cruise on one of the recall ships until I knew the plan for rectifying the fire hazard. Not necessarily because of fire danger, but due to increased odds of trip interruption to deal with the recall.

 

But, I agree, in a worse case scenario where all 45 effected ships need to be dry docked and 'fixed' this would be a very significant blow to the industry. 

[mowogo]

4 minutes ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

I'm not sure how much of a setback this is going to be. We just don't have all the facts yet. Obviously MSC and their new brand have taken on the brunt since they are refusing ship delivery. 

 

I always wonder about human psyche. If the list of 45 ships sailing is released, will people flock to cancel cruises on ships that failed fire inspection? Some may. I doubt all will.

 

As someone that was looking to book a likely impacted MSC ship, I’m now seriously considering another itinerary on a slightly older ship to get out of the blast radius of any emergency dry dock work as I can see the lines doing it this January/February during the “low” season.  

 

While MSC is refusing the Explora ship, they are also hit hard by having 5 ships newer than 2020

[BermudaBound2014]

13 minutes ago, mowogo said:

As someone that was looking to book a likely impacted MSC ship, I’m now seriously considering another itinerary on a slightly older ship to get out of the blast radius of any emergency dry dock work as I can see the lines doing it this January/February during the “low” season.  

 

While MSC is refusing the Explora ship, they are also hit hard by having 5 ships newer than 2020

 

I get it. Totally. We just don't know the 'blast radius' yet. Could be nothing, could be atomic 😉 

[Heidi13]

37 minutes ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

I'm not sure how much of a setback this is going to be. We just don't have all the facts yet. Obviously MSC and their new brand have taken on the brunt since they are refusing ship delivery. 

 

I always wonder about human psyche. If the list of 45 ships sailing is released, will people flock to cancel cruises on ships that failed fire inspection? Some may. I doubt all will.

 

Personally, I would avoid booking a cruise on one of the recall ships until I knew the plan for rectifying the fire hazard. Not necessarily because of fire danger, but due to increased odds of trip interruption to deal with the recall.

 

But, I agree, in a worse case scenario where all 45 effected ships need to be dry docked and 'fixed' this would be a very significant blow to the industry. 

 

Based on what I have read, none of the previously built ships have failed a fire inspection. When those ships were built, the products had valid type approval certification. I am unable to determine why the bulkhead panels had the type approval certification rescinded. Is the issue with 2 entire products, or specific batches of those products, as this can significantly impact the risk factors to previously built ships.

 

However, the previously built ships with these panels did have valid certification when the ship was completing final certifications, so upon delivery were fully certified. How this matter is resolved is up to the respective vessel Flag/Class Inspectors. They have a number of potential options from immediately removing the ships from service, to retesting the products (as fitted to the individual ships), to even providing time to replace the panels/reacquire certification.

 

I have dealt with similar situations on a number of our ships, especially with carpets and furniture fabrics, where manufacturers were no longer in business and the certifications had expired. Since no manufacturer was available to conducts the tests, our Flag State accepted the owner conducting the tests, so I scheduled them with Flag Inspectors in attendance. Once we passed the tests, Flag re-issued the type approval certification. Depending on the reason for rescinding type approval, this could be a potential option, with the retesting conducted ashore while the ship is operational.

 

Even with a worst case scenario of having to replace the panels, this is not work requiring a drydocking. This type of work can be completed at a wet dock, saving the huge costs of putting a ship on the blocks.

 

At this point, I suggest there's no point in speculating, as it isn't even public knowledge why the type approval certification was rescinded - did they fail an approved retesting, or was it administrative issues with the initial approval process. If they failed a retest, Flag/Class Inspectors will consider why they failed, to determine the risks to existing ships, prior to Class issuing the Master a Condition of Class.

[BermudaBound2014]

@Heidi13 thank you. I agree, no point in speculating it's early. 

 

All we know for sure is that MSC Explora 1 we set to be Christened today and at the last minute MSC canceled both the Christening the ships maiden voyage scheduled next week. At this time, the delivery pf Explora1 to MSC has been delayed for "a few weeks to make further enhancements" to the vessel. 

[VMax1700]

two types of fire-resistant panels have lost their safety certifications and are now being recalled,

 

 two types of its panels have lost their safety certifications due to recent failures in safety certification testing.

 

caused local distributors to recall the impacted panels

 

I am really not going to lose any sleep over this.  If you get rid of the printed hyperbole and click bait and look at the facts, then it is the same as any other product recall.

The Safety Certification and Standards requires ongoing testing. 

A recent batch of product suffered failures during testing.

The manufacturer notified distributors to withdraw the product from sale.

It now comes down to how often the product is manufactured.  If each production run is tested and previous productions passed the testing then there is no ongoing problem.

This happens all the time in the motor industry.  Next time your car is going in for a service, take a few photographs of the engine bay before giving it to the service center and when you get the car back have a look at the dabs of various coloured paint that have appeared on bulk heads, engine covers, timing belt covers etc.  Those paint marks relate to recalls, most of which were precautionary.  

[Heidi13]

7 hours ago, VMax1700 said:

two types of fire-resistant panels have lost their safety certifications and are now being recalled,

 

 two types of its panels have lost their safety certifications due to recent failures in safety certification testing.

 

caused local distributors to recall the impacted panels

 

I am really not going to lose any sleep over this.  If you get rid of the printed hyperbole and click bait and look at the facts, then it is the same as any other product recall.

The Safety Certification and Standards requires ongoing testing. 

A recent batch of product suffered failures during testing.

The manufacturer notified distributors to withdraw the product from sale.

It now comes down to how often the product is manufactured.  If each production run is tested and previous productions passed the testing then there is no ongoing problem.

This happens all the time in the motor industry.  Next time your car is going in for a service, take a few photographs of the engine bay before giving it to the service center and when you get the car back have a look at the dabs of various coloured paint that have appeared on bulk heads, engine covers, timing belt covers etc.  Those paint marks relate to recalls, most of which were precautionary.  

 

The type approval certifications have an expiry date, but unless the requirements change, they do not normally require ongoing testing. The testing is completed for the initial approval and the subsequent renewals are normally an administrative process requiring a renewal application, provided it hasn't expired. Many marine products have multiple type approvals from various Flag States and Class Societies and some of the subsequent type approvals use the testing data from the initial approval.

 

Prior to conducting testing, as the owner's rep, the Flag Inspector requested the initial type approval test data. Had I been able to provide that data from an approved lab, they would have re-issued the type approval without further testing.

 

As I posted previously, this is not a normal process and as I posted earlier, I haven't read any definitive confirmation that they did fail a Flag/Class testing and if so, why the products were retested.

[Guest ldtr]

11 hours ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

I'm not sure how much of a setback this is going to be. We just don't have all the facts yet. Obviously MSC and their new brand have taken on the brunt since they are refusing ship delivery. 

 

I always wonder about human psyche. If the list of 45 ships sailing is released, will people flock to cancel cruises on ships that failed fire inspection? Some may. I doubt all will.

 

Personally, I would avoid booking a cruise on one of the recall ships until I knew the plan for rectifying the fire hazard. Not necessarily because of fire danger, but due to increased odds of trip interruption to deal with the recall.

 

But, I agree, in a worse case scenario where all 45 effected ships need to be dry docked and 'fixed' this would be a very significant blow to the industry. 

Probably not. Think of all of the auto safety recalls that people pretty much ignore. Or the Boeing 737 max issues. People still.got on the planes if that was at the gate.

 

In this case most will no nothing about it. While it a problem if the is a fire on board the odds of a fire impacting one of these ships before the problem is corrected.

 

Also it is unclear exactly how they failed certification. They could have missed a benchmark by a fairly small amount, kind of like a fire-resistant  wall board only resisting for 28 minutes when the certification needed 30 kind of thing. 

 

Easy for a new ship delivery to be refused until fixed a bit more difficult to get time to replace doors in an in service ship. 

 

It really comes down to how the regulatory agencies/safety organizations/insurance etc view it and the urgency they assign to resolving the issue.

 

 

Edited July 10, 2023 by ldtr

[BermudaBound2014]

18 minutes ago, ldtr said:

Probably not. Think of all of the auto safety recalls that people pretty much ignore. Or the Boeing 737 max issues. People still.got on the planes if that was at the gate.

 

In this case most will no nothing about it. While it a problem if the is a fire on board the odds of a fire impacting one of these ships before the problem is corrected.

 

Also it is unclear exactly how they failed certification. They could have missed a benchmark by a fairly small amount, kind of like a fire-resistant  wall board only resisting for 28 minutes when the certification needed 30 kind of thing. 

 

Easy for a new ship delivery to be refused until fixed a bit more difficult to get time to replace doors in an in service ship. 

 

It really comes down to how the regulatory agencies/safety organizations/insurance etc view it and the urgency they assign to resolving the issue.

 

 

 

Are you on the Ruby? Looks like she left San Fran couple days late due to the accident. Were you allowed to get off and explore San Francisco?

[Guest ldtr]

2 hours ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

 

Are you on the Ruby? Looks like she left San Fran couple days late due to the accident. Were you allowed to get off and explore San Francisco?

I am on Majestic out of Vancouver.

[erdufylla]

3 hours ago, BermudaBound2014 said:

 

Are you on the Ruby? Looks like she left San Fran couple days late due to the accident. Were you allowed to get off and explore San Francisco?

 

I saw someone on TikTok who was on this ship and talking about the delay. They were allowed to get off the ship and explore SF, and reboard that night. They were given the option to either be off the ship for good by some time that next day (10am Sunday maybe? I forget now) and take a full refund for the cruise plus some amount of FCC (50% maybe?), or remain on the ship for the abbreviated cruise and receive a 75% refund plus some FCC (I think it was also 50%). 

[VMax1700]

8 hours ago, Heidi13 said:

The type approval certifications have an expiry date, but unless the requirements change, they do not normally require ongoing testing

Absolutely!  But ongoing quality control checks within the manufacturing process may discover that a component part is not of the required standard, or that the assembly of the entire product was not satisfactory and lead to a production halt and recall.  

 

I have just read some of the type approvals for Paroc products (sad I know!) and some of them require "periodical inspections at least every second year".

https://www.paroc.com/certificate-search

[Destiny0315]

https://travelweekly.co.uk/news/cruise/clia-and-msc-cruises-react-after-cancellation-of-explora-i-debut

[Guest ldtr]

8 hours ago, erdufylla said:

 

I saw someone on TikTok who was on this ship and talking about the delay. They were allowed to get off the ship and explore SF, and reboard that night. They were given the option to either be off the ship for good by some time that next day (10am Sunday maybe? I forget now) and take a full refund for the cruise plus some amount of FCC (50% maybe?), or remain on the ship for the abbreviated cruise and receive a 75% refund plus some FCC (I think it was also 50%). 

The two options according to a letter posted by one of the people on board was:

 

Leave   100% refund + 50% fcc

Stay  75% refund + 75% fcc

[BermudaBound2014]

2 hours ago, Destiny0315 said:

https://travelweekly.co.uk/news/cruise/clia-and-msc-cruises-react-after-cancellation-of-explora-i-debut

 

The first blogger has the story too. I expect all the bloggers to cover it today. No way the cruise lines will be able to stay tight lipped on the exact ships equipped with the faulty panels much longer.

[Heidi13]

4 hours ago, VMax1700 said:

Absolutely!  But ongoing quality control checks within the manufacturing process may discover that a component part is not of the required standard, or that the assembly of the entire product was not satisfactory and lead to a production halt and recall.  

 

I have just read some of the type approvals for Paroc products (sad I know!) and some of them require "periodical inspections at least every second year".

https://www.paroc.com/certificate-search

 

Affirmative, Paroc, as are many marine suppliers,  is ISO 9001 certified, so will have well documented QA/QC requirements, which could include requiring routine audits/testing of suppliers and their completed products. During the QA audits and QC testing, if they find issues impacting the final product they are mandated to advise the organisation that provided the type approval.

 

In addition to OEM QC testing, some of the Classification Societies may require testing for their approvals. Having dealt with multiple Class Societies, I found they each want their own approvals on products. Since we routinely dealt with 2 Class Societies, we had to ensure everything had type approval certification and was approved by both Class Societies.

 

This is a very complex subject and I will be watching closely to find if they publish details of how and why the type approval was rescinded.

[AllTheSun]

2 hours ago, Destiny0315 said:

https://travelweekly.co.uk/news/cruise/clia-and-msc-cruises-react-after-cancellation-of-explora-i-debut

Glad CLIA clarified that for me. It’s just some issues, nbd. They failed this time but they have all passed all the tests before so they will “analyze” the situation. Phew! I feel so much safer!

[AllTheSun]

Sarcasm aside, is this an issue that can’t be fixed while guests are on board? Or does that depend on how many panels would need replacement?

[VMax1700]

28 minutes ago, AllTheSun said:

They failed this time but they have all passed all the tests before so they will “analyze” the situation.

How do you think that any problem is solved?

Maybe just ask social media 'experts' for the best options?

Or analyze the problem and develop an action and recovery plan?

[VMax1700]

28 minutes ago, AllTheSun said:

Sarcasm aside, is this an issue that can’t be fixed while guests are on board? Or does that depend on how many panels would need replacement?

Do panels need replacement?  

No one on this board has any more information than can be gleaned by reading the posted links. 

[mcrcruiser]

1 minute ago, VMax1700 said:

Do panels need replacement?  

No one on this board has any more information than can be gleaned by reading the posted links. 

Very good point . Much more information is needed .now back to making money in the stock market

[Guest ldtr]

46 minutes ago, VMax1700 said:

How do you think that any problem is solved?

Maybe just ask social media 'experts' for the best options?

Or analyze the problem and develop an action and recovery plan?

Since this is CC I am sure some think that any cruises on ships that might have impacted should be refunded in total due to increased risk.

 

Joking aside I expect for any ship already delivered and in service I expect no immediate impact and that the corrective action plan will involve no or very little impact noticeable by passengers. For those under construction there is the potential for a delay depending upon the exact details which none of us have.