Holland America Lines News

The arrival of Celebrity Cruises' Infinity in San Diego Harbor today officially kicks off cruise season at the Port of San Diego. The 2,170-passenger cruise ship Infinity sailed into San Diego harbor today as part of a nine-night Pacific coastal cruise that begins and ends in San Francisco, making visits to Monterey, Santa Barbara, Catalina and Ensenada. The Port of San Diego currently expects 65 cruise ship arrivals over the course of its cruise season, which runs from September through May.

Portland Port celebrated the launch of its 2015 cruise program receiving more than 4,000 passengers over the early May Bank Holiday weekend. Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines’ Serenade of the Seas made her inaugural call on the Saturday and Holland America Lines’ Eurodam returned to the port for a second consecutive year on the Bank Holiday Monday. The port expects some 26,500 passengers to call at Portland throughout 2015. Another three cruise ships are due to call throughout May with return visits from the Serenissima, Prinsendam and Costa’s neoRomantica.

This year’s cruise shipping season in Kiel opened on Saturday, April 5 when the first cruise ship of the year, the AIDAcara, berthed in the port after sailing through the Kiel Canal. During this year’s season, which will last until mid October, 22 different cruise ships are registered to visit Kiel a total of 125 times. The highlights of the season include the Kieler Woche regatta between June 21 and June 29 during which 16 cruise ships will be in the port alongside many tall ships. Dr.

On November 28, Donjon Marine, Co., Inc., a provider of multi-faceted marine services including marine salvage, heavy lift, dredging, recycling, demolition and related emergency response services, completed heavy lift work for Grand Bahama Shipyard Limited on Grand Bahama Island. The Donjon tug Mary Alice and derrick-barge Chesapeake 1000 assisted the shipyard with the lifting, transport and placement of a pre-fabricated module weighing approximately 375 metric tons for the Holland America Lines’ Rotterdam cruise ship.

Hamworthy has completed the acquisition of Krystallon Limited. Fluid handling systems supplier Hamworthy has acquired the company that pioneered gas scrubber development as a commercially viable alternative to costly low sulphur content distillates, to comply with new International Maritime Organization (IMO) MARPOL Annex VI regulations on emissions. Last year IMO agreed the concept of Emission Control Areas, ruling that the maximum sulphur content in fuels used in such zones must be cut to 1.5%, then to 1% by 2012, and to 0.1% in 2015. The regulations are already in force in the North Sea, English Channel and the Baltic. Similarly the US and Canada have applied for ECA status for the waters extending 200 Nm from their coasts. Other countries are expected to follow suit.

Ambassadors International, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMIE), announced that Mark Detillion has joined the company March 23 and will become the company's Chief Financial Officer effective April 1, 2009. Detillion has expertise which includes performance and profitability analysis, and venture funding. For the past eight years Mr. Detillion served as the vice president of finance and chief financial officer for Cruise West in Seattle, WA. Prior to Cruise West he spent several years as the chief financial officer for Shilo Inns in Portland, OR. He also served as the director of finance for Holland America Lines. Detillion holds a B.A. in Accounting from the University of Washington and is a certified public accountant in the State of Washington. Ambassadors International, Inc.

Leica Marine GPS announced that the MX 420/8 DGPS/AIS system has been type approved by Bundesamt fur Seeschiffahrt und Hydrographie (BSH). The German type approval signifies that the Leica product complies with the IMO MSC.74 (69), ITU-R M.1371-1 and IEC 61993-2 standards for shipborne automatic identification systems (AIS) equipment. The MX 420/8 was introduced by Leica last year as a fully integrated solution to marine DGPS and AIS requirements. The system combines the industry's most accurate marine GPS receiver, a built-in dual-channel DGPS beacon receiver and an IMO-compliant AIS transponder system, with a single control and display unit.

The fickle fate of finance has clubbed yet another maritime niche, one that has been an overachiever for much of the past decade. The cruise industry, riding high for more than half a decade, was dealt a dose of reality last week when shares of the two top companies, Carnival Corp. and Royal Caribbean Cruises, were dragged to new lows after Carnival issued a financial report. The problem: profitability, a condition not easily remedied considering a decidedly toned down outlook on cruise passenger numbers for the remainder of the year and a record amount of new tonnage still contracted to come on line in the next several years. Executives of the Miami-based operator of the Carnival…

Holland America Lines announced that the first two ships of its new five-ship 85,000-ton Vista Series class will be named ms Zuiderdam and ms Oosterdam. The vessels' namesake, which are derived from the south and east "Vista" points on the compass, follow the "-dam" naming tradition that the company has followed since the late 19th century. The new Vista Series class, which was unveiled at the Sea Trade Cruise Shipping Convention in Miami Beach, Fla. on March 6, represents the ships' forward-looking design and the future direction of the company. The 1,848-passenger ships, which are under construction by Fincantieri are scheduled for delivery in September 2002, July 2003, January 2004, September 2004 and May 2005 - are expected to increase Holland America's lower berth capacity by 9,240.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC’s) Vessel Sanitation Program (VSP) has responded to an outbreak of gastrointestinal illness caused by a Norwalk virus aboard Holland America’s Ryndam by recommending that the cruise line implement aggressive sanitation and disinfection procedures. Although these measures were implemented by the crew on July 25, additional cases continued to develop, and on July 31, Holland America Lines elected to take the Ryndam out of service from August 1 through August 7 to break the cycle of the Norwalk virus being spread among passengers and crew. While the vessel is out of service, Holland America will also continue with a systematic cleaning and sanitizing of the vessel.

Seattle-based marine sales and service distributor, announced it will open a second location in Tampa, Florida, by June 2007. in Alaska. fish-processing, food, thermal, industrial and oilfield markets. The second location will feature expanded service capabilities for centrifuges, watermakers, heat exchangers, oily water separators, Omnipure MSD Systems and pumps. with Alfa Tec on the West Coast over the past decade. LLC, and OSG.

Ahead of a House hearing to tackle the issue of crime aboard cruise ships, a congressional memo on March 7 details 177 sexual misconduct incidents, ranging from inappropriate touching to rape, and four robberies of amounts over $5,000 over a three-year period. During that time, approximately 25 million people embarked on cruises from North America ports, the memo said. Disclosure of the data, supplied by Holland America Lines, Royal Caribbean Cruises and others, is unusual because cruise lines are not required by law to publish comprehensive crime statistics and criminal law varies greatly on international waters. Rep. Christopher Shays, R-Conn., wants to change that and, as chairman of the House Subcommittee on National Security, is working on legislation to make such reporting mandatory.

The Head Department of Navigation and Oceanography (HDNO) of the Russian Federation has recognized Transas vector charts in the TX-97 format for use in remote areas of the World Ocean, as per Notices to Mariners issue 32/2003 *5093/3 of August 2003. According to the HDNO recommendation, the usage of the Transas world TX-97 database with updated paper charts will improve safety of navigation. After a close verification procedure, the expert commission has confirmed that Transas vector digitized electronic charts represent a high-quality product fully compliant with all the related international standards and regulations, including the ISO: 9000 quality system. The in-house production of vector electronic charts is an important area of Transas activities.

To the dismay of some oil companies, as well as oil, freight, and passenger shipping companies, a growing number of environmental prosecutors are seeking - and winning - fines and punishments they insist are high enough to deter pollution from deliberate or even accidental oil pollution. The U.S. consistently leads the world in such prosecutions, although Canada, Australia, and a growing number of European nations are following suit. Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines (RCCL), the world's second largest cruise operator, has been the most prominent catch - paying more than $27 million in fines in the U.S. over the past two years. In court, RCCL…