Viking Sky survivors

[OnTheJourney]

Figured as much...thanks. 

[DGHOC]

Sorry Heidi13, I replied to you on the wrong thread - I'll copy my response to you here.

 

Many thanks Heidi13 for your comprehensive and detailed explanations. Thanks for your time and effort.

 

We weren't a big role call and there aren't many of us on CC who experienced this. The vast majority of us aren't the 'I survived the Viking Sky Incident' hat wearing, flag waving, bleating on about it constantly types. Of course the experience will have been handled differently by all of us. We managed ok, don't get me wrong it was no walk in the park BUT we choose not to dwell and keep harking on about it. When these conversations start up again it does open the wounds a little.

 

Your explanation of the the cranking anchor chains was fascinating. We lived through what seemed like long hours of those  screeching chains/anchors. We'd guessed what the terrible noise must be and indeed we had our laptops on with live news streams pretty much detailing our experience, confirming our worries. Whilst queueing up to beg for a lavatory to be opened, a poor lady beside me was shaking violently with the anchor noise. I hugged her and explained what it was but she felt sure that the ship was dragging across the rocks.Your explanation would have been enormously useful and reassuring then.

 

As Haworth said, we felt confident too that the 'right' decisions had been made to sail through that storm. Indeed we were enjoying the roller coaster ride from the upper deck of the Explorers lounge from early morning until suddenly the ship lost power, started drifting off to an angle allowing the waves to start pounding us from the side. We had been standing with an experienced sailor who was explaining how ships handle storms, his whole demeanour changed when the ship lost power. The situation changed very suddenly.

 

We are not engineers and would therefore not profess to comprehend the technical complexities of what took place that day; we'd certainly not attack Viking here as others choose to do. We still don't know whether there is blame to be apportioned or not. We'd prefer to await more detailed investigation and explanation.

 

As I said on a previous post, we were very surprised to read that one generator had been out of action just two days into our trip, that had never been previously mentioned. Our immediate thought on reading this report was, would you go into a storm with only 3 generators working? We'd known about the low oil levels, that was discussed soon after the event. It had been explained that they were within the limits set but towards the lower end. Is that not the case? 

 

We prefer to work with facts rather than assumptions and let's be honest, in some cases fiction. I've read total drivel on here about what took place that day from folk not even on the ship. I'm a realist, I'm not living in Viking fantasy land, but the condemnation of the Captain and Viking generally made us cross. 

 

I appreciate your balanced factual posts.

 

All good wishes to you.

[kittycrews]

Thanks for a post which reflects our feelings as well.

[Snowsranch]

We also want to say thank you for a post that reflects our feelings. In addition, the retired British navy commander who was one of the speakers on the ship spent much time explaining what the PA announcements meant at the start of this mishap. We drew much comfort from having an experienced sailor among us. Viking and its CEO have done much to make things right in our eyes (as noted, others have different experiences). As we told our friends, we will be sailing with Viking again, just probably not in the North Sea in winter conditions. 

[OnTheJourney]

4 hours ago, DGHOC said:

we were enjoying the roller coaster ride from the upper deck of the Explorers lounge from early morning until suddenly the ship lost power,

 

Yeah, I was up there too...but in retrospect....should that lounge have been evacuated as a safety precaution? At one point, a crew member told everyone to move back from the windows (lower level), but many pax didn't seem to heed him. I was even more surprised, frankly, to see crew members borrowing peoples' cameras to walk right up to the glass and take video. I mean, once things started falling out of the ceiling, I figured it was time to get out of there. 

[OnTheJourney]

1 hour ago, Snowsranch said:

 one of the speakers on the ship spent much time explaining what the PA announcements meant at the start of this mishap. 

 

Might I ask (since I've been sort of reliving this experience in the wake of renewed posting on the boards) what specific announcements you're referring to? I'd love to know, since I recall very few. I remember the master saying something about how we were going to try to stick with more inside passages as much as possible but will likely need to get back out farther from the coast. Then, I recall practically nothing until "code echo" was announced in the theatre. Shortly after, the general alarm sounded. After that, what I remember was the announcement that we would be doing helicopter evac, plus updates on the evac after that. We were off the ship fairly early - likely even one of the first helicopter runs - so are you referring perhaps to additional announcements later on the 23rd? Was there anything else announced, ship-wide, between Friday evening and Saturday morning, relative to the weather conditions, any particular plans to circumvent them, or change course, etc.?  

Edited November 16, 2019 by OnTheJourney

[Haworth]

2 minutes ago, OnTheJourney said:

 

Yeah, I was up there too...but in retrospect....should that lounge have been evacuated as a safety precaution? At one point, a crew member told everyone to move back from the windows (lower level), but many pax didn't seem to heed him. I was even more surprised, frankly, to see crew members borrowing peoples' cameras to walk right up to the glass and take video. I mean, once things started falling out of the ceiling, I figured it was time to get out of there. 

We had lunch in the world cafe and then decided too head down to our cabin, deck 5, less movement lower down, and laid on the bed trying to work out exactly how far from the vertical the ship was moving, at one point we moved glasses, water jug etc into the sink to stop them sliding off the desk, the rest as they say is history.

[Haworth]

2 minutes ago, OnTheJourney said:

 

Might I ask (since I've been sort of reliving this experience in the wake of renewed posting on the boards) what specific announcements you're referring to? I'd love to know, since I recall very few. I remember the master saying something about how we were going to try to stick with more inside passages as much as possible but will likely need to get back out farther from the coast. Then, I recall practically nothing until "code echo" was announced in the theatre. Shortly after, the general alarm sounded. Was there anything else announced, ship-wide, between Friday evening and Saturday morning, relative to the weather conditions, any particular plans to circumvent them, or change course, etc.?  

That is exactly the same as we remember, I do recall the emergency signal shortly after code echo, I turned to my wife and said "s..t, this is for real.

[OnTheJourney]

lol....you were our neighbor...as I recall from pervious posting here....we were in 5052 (and are signed up in that room again for the Iberian Explorer cruise, and so hoping that Viking assigns us the same rooms for the Rome-to-Barcelona.) 

Edited November 16, 2019 by OnTheJourney

[OnTheJourney]

1 minute ago, Haworth said:

That is exactly the same as we remember, I do recall the emergency signal shortly after code echo, I turned to my wife and said "s..t, this is for real.

 

I know....my wife said I looked white as a sheet when I finally made my way down to the theatre - a few minutes only before "code echo". Sheesh...we should talk on the phone sometime!  Less typing....

[Haworth]

3 minutes ago, OnTheJourney said:

 

I know....my wife said I looked white as a sheet when I finally made my way down to the theatre - a few minutes only before "code echo". Sheesh...we should talk on the phone sometime!  Less typing....

It was interesting, with one exception, how calm everyone was as we walked down to the theatre.

[OnTheJourney]

6 minutes ago, Haworth said:

We had lunch in the world cafe and then decided too head down to our cabin, deck 5, less movement lower down, and laid on the bed trying to work out exactly how far from the vertical the ship was moving, at one point we moved glasses, water jug etc into the sink to stop them sliding off the desk, the rest as they say is history.

 

I did the same. My wife was already in the theatre watching the movie, while I was up in the lounge getting video. Went back down to the room first and -  yeah - took video of the horizon shifting up and down - was pretty amazing at times - then lurched my way down to the theatre. 

[OnTheJourney]

Just now, Haworth said:

It was interesting, with one exception, how calm everyone was as we walked down to the theatre.

 

ABSOLUTELY....agree completely. Same for what seemed like an interminably long crawl up the stairs for evacuation - very orderly. Crew was great - they brought out probably hundreds of blankets and just sent them around for whoever wanted (since the temps dropped greatly as we made our way up towards the top of the ship). They brought around cookies, etc. - really did the best they could. 

[OnTheJourney]

Hope to meet you again sometime...who knows...we might be neighbors again on the Venus????

[Haworth]

1 minute ago, OnTheJourney said:

 

ABSOLUTELY....agree completely. Same for what seemed like an interminably long crawl up the stairs for evacuation - very orderly. Crew was great - they brought out probably hundreds of blankets and just sent them around for whoever wanted (since the temps dropped greatly as we made our way up towards the top of the ship). They brought around cookies, etc. - really did the best they could. 

We are hoping that the "reunion" cruise will have as many of the Sky crew on board as possible, they were all without exception fantastic, very capable supported by the passengers who worked in the emergency services. They were all young and without the life experience that many of us had and they were so professional.

[Haworth]

2 minutes ago, OnTheJourney said:

Hope to meet you again sometime...who knows...we might be neighbors again on the Venus????

We will have to arrange to meet for a drink at the very least.

[TexasTraveler54]

1 hour ago, OnTheJourney said:

 

Might I ask (since I've been sort of reliving this experience in the wake of renewed posting on the boards) what specific announcements you're referring to? I'd love to know, since I recall very few. I remember the master saying something about how we were going to try to stick with more inside passages as much as possible but will likely need to get back out farther from the coast. Then, I recall practically nothing until "code echo" was announced in the theatre. Shortly after, the general alarm sounded. After that, what I remember was the announcement that we would be doing helicopter evac, plus updates on the evac after that. We were off the ship fairly early - likely even one of the first helicopter runs - so are you referring perhaps to additional announcements later on the 23rd? Was there anything else announced, ship-wide, between Friday evening and Saturday morning, relative to the weather conditions, any particular plans to circumvent them, or change course, etc.?  

I believe the individual being referred to was the ship historian - veteran of the Royal Navy.  I was seated in the upper back section of the theater and he quite often came up to our area and explained what was going on.  

[OnTheJourney]

1 hour ago, Haworth said:

We will have to arrange to meet for a drink at the very least.

Definitely!!  That Saturday morning, our plans were for me to go to the spa (had not made it there yet) and, as mentioned, my wife to the movie. I was most disappointed to get down there and found the spa was closed. Sort of humorous, looking back on it, in that the spa attendants assured me that it will "reopen as soon as the captain says it's ok to do so".....oh well....maybe on the Venus...We walked around in the spa area shortly after we got onboard during our ship exploration phase, but never actually got back down there to try it. 

Edited November 16, 2019 by OnTheJourney

[OnTheJourney]

32 minutes ago, TexasTraveler54 said:

I believe the individual being referred to was the ship historian - veteran of the Royal Navy.  I was seated in the upper back section of the theater and he quite often came up to our area and explained what was going on.  

 

Most interesting!...would have enjoyed a chat with this gentleman...but even more interested in what the announcements were that Snowsranch is referring to. 

[Haworth]

1 hour ago, OnTheJourney said:

Definitely!!  That Saturday morning, our plans were for me to go to the spa (had not made it there yet) and, as mentioned, my wife to the movie. I was most disappointed to get down there and found the spa was closed. Sort of humorous, looking back on it, in that the spa attendants assured me that it will "reopen as soon as the captain says it's ok to do so".....oh well....maybe on the Venus...We walked around in the spa area shortly after we got onboard during our ship exploration phase, but never actually got back down there to try it. 

See you in there, we enjoy the pool, steam room and snow room cycle.

[OnTheJourney]

Sort of made up for it on the Summit last month. Having booked Aqua Class this last time, I had access to the "persian gardens" - salt inhalation room, turkish bath, sauna, and showers - as part of the spa. That snow room on the Sky looked really neat though - at least got to peek inside briefly. 

Edited November 16, 2019 by OnTheJourney

[JDincalif]

1 hour ago, Haworth said:

See you in there, we enjoy the pool, steam room and snow room cycle.

And don't forget the cold bucket shower. Actually, one yank of that chain was enough for this lifetime.😅 Looking forward to all the other spa pleasures.

[OnTheJourney]

Cold bucket shower? Yikes....can just imagine that after coming out of a 100+ degree steam room or similar. 

[DaveSJ711]

Hello everybody,

 

Though my wife and I weren't on the ill-fated March voyage, we've cruised three times this year with Viking -- including a trip on the Sky in July, and a trip to SE Asia that ended just two days ago.  We're definitely sold on Viking's culture and business model.  Perhaps that's due to my Scandinavian background, or perhaps it's because we enjoy our creature comforts more as we enter our "golden years." 

 

I'm also a lawyer with almost 40 years experience, primarily in business and energy law but with a fair amount of litigation work (both for plaintiffs and defendants).  So the March 23-24 incident intrigues me professionally.  I've read the class action suit against Viking that's pending in U.S. District Court in California.  I've read the interim report that the Norwegian authorities released earlier this month.  And, with amusement, I've read a comment or two on this thread that refer to "ambulance-chasing lawyers."

 

Right now the suit is in the very early stages.  The plaintiffs' attorneys and Viking's attorneys estimate that a trial, if it occurs, will require about four weeks.  But that's looking far down the road.  Between now and then, the plaintiffs' lawyers will attempt to certify the class -- a procedural requirement -- so the case is brought on behalf of all Sky passengers, rather than just the named plaintiffs.  Each side will ask the judge to resolve the case in their favor.  The discovery process will require witness interviews and document review.  And the parties will likely engage in parallel settlement discussions which, if successful, will avoid the risk and expense of time-consuming litigation.

 

The interim report is an important document, with the qualification that the final report is yet to come.  It sets out some significant findings re the actual versus recommended oil levels and the resulting loss of propulsion.  Rest assured that the plaintiffs' lawyers have memorized these findings and will use them during the case.

 

 

 

    

Edited December 1, 2019 by DaveSJ711

[DaveSJ711]

The law firm of Kaye, Rose & Partners is representing Viking in the class action suit.  The attorneys with the firm have considerable experience in cruise industry issues, including litigation.  Viking is in good legal hands.

 

Fun fact -- the firm has a high-end address in Southern California -- Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills!  As a UCLA Law grad myself, I'm definitely envious.

 

http://www.kayerose.com/index.html