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COPENHAGEN, Denmark — The luxury cruise ship MV Ocean Explorer was successfully pulled free on Thursday, three days after running aground in Greenland with 206 people on board, authorities and the ship's owner said. The Ocean Explorer will be taken to a port to assess any damage, while the passengers will be flown home, said SunStone Maritime Group, which owns the cruise vessel. “There have not been any injuries to any person onboard, no pollution of the environment and no breach of the hull,” SunStone said in a statement.
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Jay and Jill Campbell, from Garden City, South Carolina, described their ordeal with a Norwegian Cruise Line ship in an interview with WPDE, their local ABC affiliate. It’s a little bit frustrating, but we are in a beautiful part of the world,” Fraser told the paper, adding that he himself had come down with COVID-19 on the ship. “There are still no reports that human life or the environment is in acute danger,” Joint Arctic Command said. That's how much the number of cruises around Greenland has risen in the last year, per Bloomberg.
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The cruise ship -- belonging to Ulstein Group in Ulsteinvik, southern Norway -- had its maiden voyage only two years ago in 2021, according to AE Expeditions. It features a gym, jacuzzi and off-boat excursions and offers state-of-the-art amenities and “maximum passenger comfort," according to its website. Following the conclusion of the righting operation, the ship was kept on the platform while further inspections were made and the starboard sponsons attached.
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Officials in the Dominican Republic have confirmed that a large cruise ship had run aground off the Caribbean island nation’s north coast shortly after leaving the port of Puerto Plata. LONDON -- A luxury cruise ship carrying 206 passengers has run aground off the coast of Greenland. Seeing the varied landscapes, abundant marine wildlife, and tidewater glaciers by cruise ship is one of the top ways to travel to and around Alaska. The total cost of the disaster, including victims' compensation, refloating, towing and scrapping costs, is estimated at $2 billion, more than three times the ship's $612 million construction cost. Costa Cruises offered compensation to passengers (to a limit of €11,000 per person) to pay for all damages, including the value of the cruise; one third of the survivors took the offer.
Rescue efforts underway for luxury cruise ship that ran aground in Greenland
Rescue efforts underway for luxury cruise ship that ran aground in Greenland - ABC News
Rescue efforts underway for luxury cruise ship that ran aground in Greenland.
Posted: Wed, 13 Sep 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]
"We are waiting on the relevant authorities for advice regarding our next steps," the company said in an emailed statement. As of Wednesday morning Eastern time, the cruise ship was still grounded, officials said. The Joint Arctic Command said the ship grounded in Alpefjord, part of the Northeast Greenland National Park, the world's largest national park, on Tuesday. According to Greenland travel site Visit Greenland, the remote area is an area considered an "Arctic Desert" because annual rainfall is so low. A couple says they were stranded on a small African island after they missed a cruise ship's boarding deadline, according to local media.
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Crew members attempted to float clear of land at several high tides but were unsuccessful because the boat is held in place by suction from mud, Jensen told Bloomberg.
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In a first step to prevent pollution of the shore and assist in a refloat the ship, its oil and fuel tanks were emptied. The company said in a statement the three passengers were in isolation and were “doing well”. The vessel ran aground earlier this week in Alpefjord in the Northeast Greenland National Park. A spokesperson for the cruise line said that the ship could not safely dock in Gambia due to adverse weather conditions, adding that efforts are being made for the guests to rejoin the ship in Senegal on Tuesday. In total, WPDE said that nine passengers were not allowed to reenter the ship, including four elderly people and one person who is a paraplegic.
Ocean Explorer: Luxury cruise ship freed after running aground in a Greenland fjord - CNN
Ocean Explorer: Luxury cruise ship freed after running aground in a Greenland fjord.
Posted: Thu, 14 Sep 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]
The Ocean Explorer is among an "award-winning Infinity-class of vessels," according to Aurora Expeditions, which offers excursions on the vessel. According to the company, the Ocean Explorer is meant to accommodate 134 expeditioners. The Joint Arctic Command says that when they came across the vessel, there were 206 people onboard. And last November, passengers were stranded at a Brisbane port after a Royal Caribbean ship was overbooked. "Now it is exciting to find out what the condition of the ship is," Jensen was quoted as saying by KNR. "They are in the process of investigating whether the ship is intact and seaworthy and ready to sail on."
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Hill said after the crew alerted passengers that there were confirmed cases of Covid, some passengers had chosen to wear masks in the public areas, but others had not. The ship was designed with luxury, offering "state-of-the-art amenities," including an onboard gym, jacuzzi, lounges, a spa, an atrium, a library and more. According to WPDE, the group flew to Gambia on Sunday, hoping to rejoin the ship at another port.
Tarajoq, a Greenland Institute of Natural Resources fishing research ship, arrived at the site on Tuesday and attempted to pull the boat out. For an increasingly large number of polar cruisers, Greenland and Svalbard in Norway have become the most popular destinations for Arctic tourism. The primary mission of the Joint Arctic Command is to ensure Danish sovereignty by monitoring the area around the Faeroe Islands and Greenland, including the Arctic Ocean in the north. Greenland is a semi-independent territory that is part of the Danish realm, as are the Faeroe Islands. The cruise liner began its current trip on Sept. 2 in Kirkenes in Arctic Norway and was due to return to Bergen, Norway, on Sept. 22, according to SunStone Ships. Cmdr. Brian Jensen of the Joint Arctic Command told Greenland broadcaster KNR that the ship is likely to go to Iceland, the closest place with large ports.
Other passengers may face the stress of becoming stranded in remote locations through no fault of their own. Last September, more than 200 people got stuck in a remote part of Greenland after their cruise ship ran aground. The ship was freed by a fisheries research vessel at high tide, said the cruise ship’s owner, Copenhagen-based SunStone Ships, and the Danish Joint Arctic Command, which had been coordinating the operation. The cruise ship ran aground Monday above the Arctic Circle in Alpefjord in Northeast Greenland National Park, the world's northernmost national park. The park is nearly the size of France and Spain combined, and approximately 80% is covered by an ice sheet.
The São Tomé and Príncipe Coast Guard even took the passengers to the ship, but they weren't able to get on and had to turn back, WPDE reported. Authorities have been in contact with another cruise ship in the area and it had been asked to remain nearby to assist should the situation develop. “Accommodating just 134 expeditioners, the Ocean Explorer was purpose-built for expedition travel to the world’s most remote destinations. This small ship is outfitted with the latest cutting-edge technology, sustainability and navigation capabilities,” AE Expeditions says on its website detailing the vessel. The U.S. State Department confirmed there were "several" Americans onboard the cruise ship, but did not have further details. "The crew in Knud Rasmussen is doing their best to get there as soon as possible. Due to the weather in the area where Knud Rasmussen is, the ship has had to slow down a bit," Joint Arctic Command said in a statement Wednesday.
Rescue efforts aren't expected to reach the scene until Friday, but a military flight over the ship confirmed its hull is intact, there is no oil spilling from the vessel, and there have been no injuries. The best of Alaska's glaciers and ports are yours on the ultimate Alaska cruise, with perfectly sized ships that get you closer to all the wonder... On Wednesday, a research ship owned by the Greenland government unsuccessfully attempted to pull the ship off ground during high tide. "There have not been any injuries to anybody onboard, no pollution of the environment and no breach of the hull,” SunStone Ships said in a statement. Many of the passengers on board are believed to be Australian, along with a mix of tourists from other countries including New Zealand, Britain, the United States and South Korea.
There was no immediate comment from the tour company that organised the trip, Australia-based Aurora Expeditions. Jensen told Greenland broadcaster KNR that the ship is likely to go to Iceland, the closest place with large ports. The Joint Arctic Command is a joint operational territorial command of the Danish Defence operating in Greenland and the Faroe Islands. As well as protecting the sovereignty of the Kingdom of Denmark in the Arctic Region, it carries out search and rescue missions, research and pollution prevention tasks in the region. With the closest Danish Defence ship over 2,000km away at the time of the incident, help was not expected to arrive until Friday evening.
The elderly passenger who was concussed was returned to the US, where she has made a "safe return," a spokesperson for Norwegian Cruise Line said. It added that the deadline to return was "communicated broadly" over the ship's intercom, in printed communications, and on posts shown at the exits of the ship. The Norwegian Cruise Line said in a statement provided to BI by email that eight guests on the tour missed the last tender back to the vessel. Most of the stranded passengers didn't have their medication or working credit cards, WPDE said. They were refused entry to the ship upon their return, according to WPDE, even though they could still see the ship from the shore.
She said the passengers were in good spirits and were being entertained by lectures and stories of expeditions by the crew. The Ocean Explorer ship was pulled loose by research vessel Tarajoq, which is run by the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources, the Danish military’s Joint Arctic Command said on Facebook. While officials said the situation remains "difficult," they've "gained assurance that the crew and passengers of Ocean Explorer are in good condition," according to a translation.
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