Just off Freedom caught in storm October 9th

[reallyitsmema]

 

Hope this link works. Direct from the Captain. Also, some good video from same poster of the dining room during the early part of the storm.

Thanks for the link to those videos. Those poor waiters were really having a tough time. In "Attack 1", that poor waiter ended up falling on their table! The woman behind the camera sounded very nervous in the first few videos.

[SpeedGeek]

Oh that is too funny.............

 

Loved seeing Capt Rob talking about the storm too...........I wish he was going to still be on this Sunday....:(

 

He's not? I hope it's just that he's scheduled to be off the Freedom and not anything due to the storm...

[PH8]

He's not? I hope it's just that he's scheduled to be off the Freedom and not anything due to the storm...

well, according to those who know captains schedules,its his turn to be off.:(

[katie0355]

We thought the lightning show was great!! Haha we thought about raiding the mini fridge but then got caught up in taking video!

[garnetpalmetto]

So Capt. Rob is a stand up comic at heart!:D Teehee!

 

He definitely is. There were some on our cruise who didn't "get" his sense of humor but my wife and I enjoyed it immensely. His daily navigational updates were a hoot. "Ocean depth is x feet and 3 inches." I'm sure given the circumstances of this cruise he refrained from telling his "good news/bad news" joke, though.

[BecciBoo]

Thanks for the link to those videos. Those poor waiters were really having a tough time. In "Attack 1", that poor waiter ended up falling on their table! The woman behind the camera sounded very nervous in the first few videos.

 

Of course the wife is histerical, the husband says it's exciting and thinks he may get a refund....:D The lightening is phenominal!

[SpeedGeek]

He definitely is. There were some on our cruise who didn't "get" his sense of humor but my wife and I enjoyed it immensely. His daily navigational updates were a hoot. "Ocean depth is x feet and 3 inches." I'm sure given the circumstances of this cruise he refrained from telling his "good news/bad news" joke, though.

 

Oh he said good news/bad news more than a few times. I enjoyed his humor, though at first it seemed as if he wasn't comfortable with public speaking. After I while I just realized that's his normal tone.

[PH8]

Im surprised the curtains werent closed in the MDR......

[EVALUATOR]

Oh he said good news/bad news more than a few times. I enjoyed his humor, though at first it seemed as if he wasn't comfortable with public speaking. After I while I just realized that's his normal tone.

 

You mentioned a lightning storm prior to the decline in conditions.

 

Should that have influenced the ships route at all?

 

Where was the Freedom when the roughest weather hit? How far from Port Canaveral? There seems to be some questions about the port being closed or not. But two hours after sailing, the Freedom could have been 30-40 miles from the port.

[reallyitsmema]

Im surprised the curtains werent closed in the MDR......

I thought the same thing as I was watching the videos! Everyone was staring at all the lightning flashes. You would have thought they would have closed them at the beginning of service for the ambiance.

[BecciBoo]

I love a good lightening/thunderstorm. The more the better, of course I have never been in a tornado so I do have respect for them, but still love God's big show. Our one cruise with bad weather was exhilarating. We were on deck as much as they'd let us. That was way back on Splendour, much smaller ship. More movement too. But no broken dishes, thank God. That would've been a roller coaster ride for me. Scary but good.

[goouchjac]

Anybody know if Capt. Rob will be on the Jan.29th 2012 Freedom sailing,,would like to meet him,,,I don't know if he was our capt. last year on our Freedom cruise,,don't remember who it was...:cool:

[garnetpalmetto]

Oh he said good news/bad news more than a few times. I enjoyed his humor, though at first it seemed as if he wasn't comfortable with public speaking. After I while I just realized that's his normal tone.

 

The specific good news/bad news joke I'm thinking of was at the C&A reception. "I've got good news and bad news. The bad news is that there's a storm coming. 80 knot winds, 20 foot seas....and snow. The good news? I just saved a bunch of money on my car insurance!"

[SpeedGeek]

You mentioned a lightning storm prior to the decline in conditions.

 

Should that have influenced the ships route at all?

 

Where was the Freedom when the roughest weather hit? How far from Port Canaveral? There seems to be some questions about the port being closed or not. But two hours after sailing, the Freedom could have been 30-40 miles from the port.

 

We departed at the normal time (4:30/4:45) and the first list occurred at approximately 7:30. So yeah, we were out to sea a bit, but I don't know exactly how much. Let's say it took an hour to go 5nm (clearing the channel at PC and out into the open water), and then the speed was 15 kts for the next two hours, that is about 35nm from the terminal, which is just over 40 miles (considering straight line distances). All assumptions, but I'd consider it reasonable. I have a picture of the TV that might help but it's on a camera at home. I'll try to grab the card at lunch.

 

I don't know how close we were to the storm; just that the flashes of lightning were visible through the window, so I couldn't say whether or not it should have affected our course. According to the Captain, the main thing on his mind when the wind speed climbed was keeping the ship safe, which meant turning into the wind, and that's what we did.

[PattyG12]

Anybody know if Capt. Rob will be on the Jan.29th 2012 Freedom sailing,,would like to meet him,,,I don't know if he was our capt. last year on our Freedom cruise,,don't remember who it was...:cool:

 

You would know if he was your captain. But last year he was sailing on the Enchantment.

[SpeedGeek]

The specific good news/bad news joke I'm thinking of was at the C&A reception. "I've got good news and bad news. The bad news is that there's a storm coming. 80 knot winds, 20 foot seas....and snow. The good news? I just saved a bunch of money on my car insurance!"

 

Hehehe, yeah I forgot about that one. The snow was the best part! :D

[crazy canadian]

We were on the FOS last Sunday evening and this was my experience. First a little back ground information. This was our 15th cruise in 12 years. I was traveling with my wife and 2 kids (7 and 4 years old) and both sets of grand parents. Our cabins were on the second floor and several times during the peak of the storm our port hole windows were submerged under water from waves hitting the ship. There was a small amount of water that came in through the window. This made me nervous because I had always presumed that they were water tight. At this point we called house keeping to get life jackets for the kids because we had not received them prior to the muster drill. The gentlemen asked us to look out our stateroom door and ask one of the crew to get us some and that he would call back shortly to make sure we were looked after. My wife then looked out into the hallway and waited until she saw a crew member to ask. She received the same comment a couple of times from 2 different crew members that it was not there responsiblity. We then waited for a call back from house keeping and one never came. Our 4 year old was thankfully sleeping but I am sure our 7 year old could see the fear and worried looks on our faces. The next day we received a letter from the captain apoligizing for not only scaring the passangers but for also scaring a lot of the crew. Talking to different crew members afterwards, a lot of them stated that it was the worst weather related experience they had gone through and a lot of them had been working on cruise ships up to 13 years. I also found out about mistakes that where made. The pools were not emptied before the storm. The ships ballast tanks were not filled early enough. The captain and the crew did a great job, but mistakes were still made, and I for one think the first one was leaving Port Canaveral. Because they sailed, they put the passangers and crews safety at risk.The rest of the cruise was great. We will defently cruise again, but not during hurricane season!

[hotrod1954]

Thanks for the picture of the meter. I had several conversations with fellow passengers about the degree of listing. My guess...just based on my experience was that the list was about 10, maybe 12 degrees. I did speak to someone that was going to ask while visiting the bridge on Friday. Hopefully they were able to get a clear idea. I heard that 18 was reported from the bridge...but that has not been confirmed.

 

As far as the storm itself-I have not had enough time to look at all the data yet-just got back home this afternoon. However, from what I can tell, it was not a tropical system. While the winds may have been at hurricane force, and the rain was very heavy like a tropical system, it has all the signs of being a cold-core or non-tropical system. The point I am making is that this sort of set-up could happen any time of the year...fortunately, a rare occurance. In fact, when I was looking at radar during our sail-away, I remember thinking to myself how the storm was looking like a derecho...more of a winter/spring phenomenom, but usually over land at higher lattitudes. I will explain all of this on the web page going up in the next few days...it just seems like one of those days where all the ingredients came together at the wrong time.

 

More later...

This from the weather blog someone posted earlier in this thread very interesting reading

the rader show how the wind could change directions 180 degrees like the captian said

http://www.weather.com/blog/weather/8_25746.html

[LeeBe]

The rest of the story goes like this:

 

The first mate asks "Why?" and the captain responds "I don't want my men to see me bleed". First mate says "It's an honor to sail with you sir" and starts to head off when another crewmember calls out "There's a whole armada out there!" and the Captain turns back to the first mate and says "Forget the red shirt, get my brown trousers!"

 

He then mentioned his own brown trousers were in the wash :D

 

That's a great one:D! LOL... Thanks!

[Tonka's Skipper]

We were on the FOS last Sunday evening and this was my experience. First a little back ground information. This was our 15th cruise in 12 years. I was traveling with my wife and 2 kids (7 and 4 years old) and both sets of grand parents. Our cabins were on the second floor and several times during the peak of the storm our port hole windows were submerged under water from waves hitting the ship. There was a small amount of water that came in through the window. This made me nervous because I had always presumed that they were water tight. At this point we called house keeping to get life jackets for the kids because we had not received them prior to the muster drill. The gentlemen asked us to look out our stateroom door and ask one of the crew to get us some and that he would call back shortly to make sure we were looked after. My wife then looked out into the hallway and waited until she saw a crew member to ask. She received the same comment a couple of times from 2 different crew members that it was not there responsiblity. We then waited for a call back from house keeping and one never came. Our 4 year old was thankfully sleeping but I am sure our 7 year old could see the fear and worried looks on our faces. The next day we received a letter from the captain apoligizing for not only scaring the passangers but for also scaring a lot of the crew. Talking to different crew members afterwards, a lot of them stated that it was the worst weather related experience they had gone through and a lot of them had been working on cruise ships up to 13 years. I also found out about mistakes that where made. The pools were not emptied before the storm. The ships ballast tanks were not filled early enough. The captain and the crew did a great job, but mistakes were still made, and I for one think the first one was leaving Port Canaveral. Because they sailed, they put the passangers and crews safety at risk.The rest of the cruise was great. We will defently cruise again, but not during hurricane season!

 

 

Well here is the perfect example of why EVERYONE should have and put on thier Life Jackets during the Boat Drill........in the middle of a nasty storm is not the time to be looking for them and then trying to get it on...

 

 

IMO and most other professional Seaman..........AKK

[K1200S]

Here are two pictures I took from my forward port side cabin.

 

Second shows wave spray covering the window.

[xevioso]

We were on the oct. 2nd and the oct. 9th sailings.

 

Saturday night (oct 8th) was pretty rough with a lot of fore and aft slapping.

We thought it was all over by Sunday morning. Little did we know:eek:.

 

Sunday Night was a bit of rock and roll, followed by a 12 degree list to port.

This meant that the wind and rain were coming almost horizontally against the starboard side resulting in the water piling up against the balcony doors and seeping in to soak the carpets. The crew spent most of the week replacing carpets, and as we departed today a crew of carpet layers were coming on board to replace more carpets.

 

Just about every bar on the ship lost all their liquor and glass wear. The Dining room crew worked until about 4:30 AM cleaning up the broken dishes etc.

 

As far as the wisdom of departing is concerned, bear in mind that only Freedom was pointed down the channel, so it could go more or less straight out into the wind. Disney was too much angled to get away from the pier with the wind on its port side. The Carnival ship would have had to do a 360 degree turn in the basin. Neither of those choices could be considered safe.

 

As was pointed out earlier, the harbormaster and the pilot had to concur with the decision to leave.

 

The maximum list was 12 degrees on a ship designed to handle a 44 degree list.

 

The cause of the list was a severe Microburst (a tremendous downdraft that goes horizontal when it hits the surface) which is NOT visable on radar.

 

In my humble opinion, The captain and crew did a great job with an unexpected situation.

 

HATS OFF TO CAPT. ROB AND HIS CREW:):):)

 

Tom

 

I just got off this cruise yesterday...my 4th cruise overall. It was a pretty disturbing experience that first night.

 

The "general Store" which is really just a liquor store, lost 1000 bottles when they all fell off the shelves. AT one point I did get my life jacket out, because of the severe list; we did not know how far the ship could go before tipping over.

 

I have been in a Microburst before, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, many years ago when a massive downdraft hit the ground at incredible speeds and the wind knocked out all the windows nearby in one burst.

 

to the above poster:

1) Where did you hear it was a microburst? I would have thought the list was caused by the captain turning the ship into the wind again when it switched 180 degrees.

2) I have not been able to find online the maximum list for a ship like this of 44 degrees. We were actually searching for this information...

3) There seems to be some confusion on the list experienced; did the captain say it was 12 degrees?

 

Thanks...

[K1200S]

I just got off this cruise yesterday...my 4th cruise overall. It was a pretty disturbing experience that first night.

 

The "general Store" which is really just a liquor store, lost 1000 bottles when they all fell off the shelves. AT one point I did get my life jacket out, because of the severe list; we did not know how far the ship could go before tipping over.

 

I have been in a Microburst before, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, many years ago when a massive downdraft hit the ground at incredible speeds and the wind knocked out all the windows nearby in one burst.

 

to the above poster:

1) Where did you hear it was a microburst? I would have thought the list was caused by the captain turning the ship into the wind again when it switched 180 degrees.

2) I have not been able to find online the maximum list for a ship like this of 44 degrees. We were actually searching for this information...

3) There seems to be some confusion on the list experienced; did the captain say it was 12 degrees?

 

Thanks...

At the diamond breakfast I sat with the IT ops manager, James Brown, and he said it was 12 degrees. James also said the design spec was 45 degrees for a rightable list. During the cruise they aired the building of Voyager and in the video they said the ship had to return from a 45 degree list.

[SpeedGeek]

We were on the FOS last Sunday evening and this was my experience. First a little back ground information. This was our 15th cruise in 12 years. I was traveling with my wife and 2 kids (7 and 4 years old) and both sets of grand parents. Our cabins were on the second floor and several times during the peak of the storm our port hole windows were submerged under water from waves hitting the ship. There was a small amount of water that came in through the window. This made me nervous because I had always presumed that they were water tight. At this point we called house keeping to get life jackets for the kids because we had not received them prior to the muster drill. The gentlemen asked us to look out our stateroom door and ask one of the crew to get us some and that he would call back shortly to make sure we were looked after. My wife then looked out into the hallway and waited until she saw a crew member to ask. She received the same comment a couple of times from 2 different crew members that it was not there responsiblity. We then waited for a call back from house keeping and one never came. Our 4 year old was thankfully sleeping but I am sure our 7 year old could see the fear and worried looks on our faces. The next day we received a letter from the captain apoligizing for not only scaring the passangers but for also scaring a lot of the crew. Talking to different crew members afterwards, a lot of them stated that it was the worst weather related experience they had gone through and a lot of them had been working on cruise ships up to 13 years. I also found out about mistakes that where made. The pools were not emptied before the storm. The ships ballast tanks were not filled early enough. The captain and the crew did a great job, but mistakes were still made, and I for one think the first one was leaving Port Canaveral. Because they sailed, they put the passangers and crews safety at risk.The rest of the cruise was great. We will defently cruise again, but not during hurricane season!

 

It's mother nature, and on a cruise ship we are always at her mercy. I'm not going to fault the Captain or crew for sailing into an area that was forecast as a safe journey only to find that the forecast was wrong.

 

Don't want to cruise during hurricane season? Wunderbar, maybe prices will come down that much more for me! :D

[BecciBoo]

I also found out about mistakes that where made. The pools were not emptied before the storm. The ships ballast tanks were not filled early enough. The captain and the crew did a great job, but mistakes were still made, and I for one think the first one was leaving Port Canaveral. Because they sailed, they put the passangers and crews safety at risk.The rest of the cruise was great. We will defently cruise again, but not during hurricane season!

 

Now just where did you get your information about ballast tanks. None of the service staff would know anything about how full the ballast tanks were. That info would have to come from someone in engineering or the bridge. Which one of these did you talk to? Just wondering.:)