One of the "WAVE" people (long)

[claudie]

I keep reading about long (4 hour) waits on the Miami pier due to immigration. In all fairness to NCL I received in my Freestyle the day before Miami a letter regarding the procedure we would face once we arrived in Miami. Maybe some people didn't receive this paper or didn't read it. But by 10:30 a.m. I was laying in the sun at South Beach not standing on a pier in Miami. NCL warned us that the estimated time of reboarding would be 10:30 a.m. so I made sure to have my bags packed for the beach. I'm not sure who is at fault here. Anyone scheduled for excursions was also warned to be prepared to just continue on once the immigration process for them was completed. Why is NCL the bad guy in THIS particular situation?

[cruzelovr]

yes, this is what a lot of would like to know. friends of ours cruise every year and have come face to face with hurricanes brewing and then the captain changed course to move away from the storm, making a necessary itinerary change. I am sorry but I feel NCL was selfish this time and it very well may be the only time, but it made a difference. They changed our itinerary at the last day or so? They have lied about why the change was taking place, and now I see Ms. Robeson is saying we all got $200 credit on our stateroom bill, well everyone I talked to got $100 which isn't enough to cancel one of our planned ports, for something that only benefitted NCL. The captain knew the storm was already in progress and the fact of the matter is, he sailed right into it on a direct course to NYC. wake up. NCL wants everyone to think this was all an innocent mistake, if not for the "wave" they would have pulled it off, and only cost the passengers Nassau, 5 hours early arrival in NYC and 4 hours standing on the pier in Miami for immigration, yeah this cruise was a real blast. Yes, the service personnel were wonderful and we were willing to overlook the loss of Nassau, but to spend an entire day on NCL's island, spending money on NCL drinks, instead of getting to go on our planned Nassau excursion - is just another example of NCL's lack of interest in our comfort and in making this a vacation to remember in a good way.

 

You weren't really missing much by not going to Nassau, IMHO...

[swoosh2005]

i'm a member of the media who was on the ship, and i agree that the coverage was just awful. i thought the crew was outstanding, as was the captain. pls see my article in today's wall street journal. it can be found at opinionjournal.com on the taste page.http://www.opinionjournal.com.

 

Barbara-Great article!

[Sailaway...Sailaway]

Just don't stand up and "go" and you'll be fine. :D

 

Someone stole my line about sharks being the media :) Great minds and all that. So glad you are home safe! Your experience would probably make me afraid of bathrooms for life!!

[Sailaway...Sailaway]

And, I've experienced two VERY rough patches on a couple cruises sailing to and from Mexico (West coast.) The first time was our first cruise and not too long after we sailed out of LA in ' 88 on a 36,000 ton ship. It was so bad they "battened down the hatches" and the captain apologized profusely to everyone that the sea was so rough. Some of the crew remarked how they were even scared. The water was coming out of the pool onto the deck. I can remember trying to get ready for our first dinner. ::urp:: Each time I got up to put my clothes on, I felt so queasy I honestly thought I would miss our first dinner. Well, the next morning it was bright and sunny and so was the rest of our cruise.

 

The second time it happened the ship was 46,000 tons and the same itinerary. It was on our last day and night heading back to LA. I think what made it worse is that we had a cabin waaaay up front. You could feel the ship going up and then beating down on the water. I honestly thought we were hitting something else! And, ooooooooohhh, talk about being seasick. Between my husband and me, we both made good use of the bathroom. Otherwise all we could do is lay in bed all day and night. Each time we attempted to get our suitcases packed to put out in the hallway by midnight, we just groaned and laid back down. I honestly would have given anyone permission just to shoot me and throw me overboard, I felt so bad. I was also almost 6 months pregnant which didn't help..although I doubt that had anything to do with the way we felt. Very high and rough seas is what did it.

 

 

Thank you so much for this post. It's nice to read an account from someone who was there and can be objective in their report. I tried to read another account from someone who was very bitter about the whole cruise, but when they stated they saw blood and glass everywhere, I knew it wasn't going to be very objective. The size of the ship and the amount of passengers on the ship makes it hard to believe that there could be blood everywhere with four injuries. And don't get me wrong, even one injury is sad. But so are the deaths and injuries I read about in my morning paper from car accidents.

 

To those who want to blame the Captain and NCL for being in that storm, you need to check out some of the threads on other cruise line forums. There were several cruise ships who also weathered that same storm with the same experiences as the Dawn except for that rogue wave. On one I read where everyone was confined inside the ship due to waves over the decks.

 

Thank you again for an objective report. I'm so happy you and the others made it home safe after this experience.

[caren]

I keep reading about long (4 hour) waits on the Miami pier due to immigration. In all fairness to NCL I received in my Freestyle the day before Miami a letter regarding the procedure we would face once we arrived in Miami. Maybe some people didn't receive this paper or didn't read it. But by 10:30 a.m. I was laying in the sun at South Beach not standing on a pier in Miami. NCL warned us that the estimated time of reboarding would be 10:30 a.m. so I made sure to have my bags packed for the beach. I'm not sure who is at fault here. Anyone scheduled for excursions was also warned to be prepared to just continue on once the immigration process for them was completed. Why is NCL the bad guy in THIS particular situation?

\

 

In NCL's letter to us onbaord dated April 15, 2005, I quote " We apologize again for the change to this week's itinerary, and particularly the unexpected and lengthy immigration inspection on Thursday in Miami"

 

NCL changed the itinerary to get us back by 5 AM, starting a chain of events that snowballed, including the Miami disaster. Apparantly NCL Believed they were at fault for this as they apologized for it and at that point decided to give us a 25% future cruise credit.

 

I personally wan't affected by Miami because my kids and I went on an excursion, but DH stayed back. He wanted to see Miami on his own later, and he should have been able to do that. BUt after the near riot at immigration, he no longer felt like doing anything. I'm sure you have already read a desription of what happened there so I will not repeat.

 

Claudie, this didn't affect you or me personally, but alot of pax were affected that day.

[singitalto]

I was also on the wave cruise. My family and I were asked to tell about out experence on the "Fox and Friends" morning news show Tuesday on live TV. They didn't know what kind of experence we had(positive or negative) before we went on air.

We happen to think NCL Dawn has a great crew and did a great job of trying to keep passengers happy after the fact- and said that on the show. Face it, the cruise had strikes against it with the change in itinary, the Miami fiasco and then the perfect storm. All in all, NCL did the right thing with refunding 1/2 and crediting 1/2 to all passengers.

 

We will cruise again. Hopefully on the Dawn, I now know she can handle the big storms!!

[HeatherInFlorida]

i'm a member of the media who was on the ship, and i agree that the coverage was just awful. i thought the crew was outstanding, as was the captain. pls see my article in today's wall street journal. it can be found at opinionjournal.com on the taste page.http://www.opinionjournal.com.

 

Barbara, I so enjoyed reading your article and I have shared it with others. I'm afraid there are so many people getting on ships these days that just don't realize the ocean can be formidable. Some just have to "blame" someone, rather than nature herself. Thank you for linking us to your article. Fantastic.

 

Caren, cruiselines do not issue credits necessarily because they think they are at fault, but rather as a good business effort to say "we're sorry you were disappointed". It's not fair to assume that because they issued a credit, they believed they did anything wrong.

 

Life isn't always "fair", things happen to mess up our vacations now and again. Somehow with all the very real problems in the world, I think everyone should be able to move on from these little bumps in the road. And comparatively speaking, not being able to see Miami is a very tiny bump:D .

[EscapeFromConnecticut]

Nobody is trying to relate any of what happened to us with the Titanic, which was a great tragedy. What we are saying it was some coincidence that we went into the storm on April 15. What are the odds?. (the "WAVE" did not hit until April 16.)

 

That's a fair and valid question, theroos. One that an independent NTSB investigation should answer.

[bardeep]

caren, we were at tempanyaki, but not on tuesday evening. so it wasn't us. regards, barbara

[watchdiva]

DH and I sailed on the Zuiderdam 4/16/05 and experienced extremely rough seas also on Saturday night (on our way to Half Moon Cay). The captain announced at appro. 7 PM that evening that we would experience about 2-2-1/2 hours of rough seas - we were sailing into a 40+ knot wind and seas were running about 15-20 FT; there was no way around it. The pools were closed at around that time also. We live 20 minutes from Ft. Lauderdale and had been hearing all week about extremely rough sea conditions, rip currents etc so we were not totally unprepared for rough seas.

 

I sympathize with all who were on the Wave Cruise - I'm sure it was an experience that most (if not all) would have preferred to miss. I cannot believe that any captain would bow to pressure from headquarters to return on time IF he felt that either his ship or his passengers would be in jeopardy. Remember, his life is at stake also! The compensation from NCL was (IMHO) reasonable under the circumstances.

 

Cruise lines change itineraries as the need arises - it's a fact of cruising life.

 

I cannot imagine how scared most of the passengers must have been but am thankful that injuries were kept to a minimum.

[synergysystems]

When the "wave" hit the Dawn, I just happened to be looking at the Bridge Cam because I was leaving on a cruise on the 17th. All of a sudden, I saw what looked like a "rock jetty" off at about a 45 degree angle to the bow. I first thought, They aren't in port.... What's up?.... It was kinda off in the distance, and not so clear, but it was very large and very long. Unfortunately, I never got to save the image because it "updated", and i lost it.

 

 

Well.. a few hours ago I got off of the Dawn. We were on the cruise after the "wave" cruise. The ship looked as if nothing ever happened....except for the two empty Bow Jacuzzi wells, and a badly bent stern radar service platform. A crew member was cutting it off of the ship as we tendered to Great Stirrup Cay. It was gone when we got back. But...The crew was amazing, so I find it hard to believe that anyone could suggest that the crew didn't seem to care. We had an awesome time. It's a testiment to the structural integrity of the ship that it handled a massive wall of water like that. It's also a testiment to the crew, who looked like nothing ever happened. I will DEFINATELY sail on the Dawn again.