Newspapers in Europe are reporting that the former Royal Caribbean Sovereign of the Seas suffered an engine failure on one of its two main engines on May 10th while sailing from Barcelona to Tunis. It then limped instead to Naples for repairs.
Its current owner/operator, Pullmantur Cruises, attempted to repair the cruise ship in Naples but the repair pair attempts were unsuccessful. The ship was re-positioned to Civitavecchia and the cruise was cancelled.
The plans are now to undergo repairs at a shipyard in Marseille in the hope that it will be able to cruise under full power at the end of May.
After leaving the Royal Caribbean fleet, the cruise ship was re-named the Sovereign and it underwent a new, blue paint job of its hull.
According to one news account, the cruise line company said it regretted “deeply” the interruption of the cruise, thanking passengers for “patience and collaboration.” It said that it will return the fare for the cruise, and reimburse passenger expenses related to the problem with the ship. It also offered a 60% discount on the purchase of another Pullmantur cruise.
The Sovereign is a relatively old cruise ship, having been delivered in 1988.
Update: A reader of our Facebook page stated:
“It has four main engines. Made by Pielstick 9PC 20L and they are a piece of shit engines. Only made 13 totally of them for Sovereign,Majesty and Monarch of the seas…. One of them on Sovereign had a major breakdown many years ago and they got the 13th engine that was a test engine installed in replacement.
They have never been good engines. They run on heavy fuel, mounted on rubber 2+2 on the same gear and they delivered a lot less power then they where supposed to on test run. No problem Pielshit said and mounted a lot bigget turbo chargers on them to boost the power up. And that worked,, but that made them run hotter and we changed exhaust valves on them all the time. So the French guys should stick to eating snails and crock monsieurs and leave the engine building to the Germans.”
Photo Credit: Portal World Cruises