With all of the latest news surounding the shipbreaking activity in Indian, The Indian Supreme Court would be better off doing us all a favor by banning the SS Norway. It's because of the SS Norway's profile is why all of the negative spotlight is on Alang.

If the scrappers what to maintain their way of life and the corruption that comes with it, they should seriously consider letting the SS Norway go. Otherwise, serious changes will be in store for them....The kind of changes that will put a lot of shipbreakers out of business if they got the go ahead to breakup the SS Norway.

They should have realized that no one would have cared about the working conditions of their scrapyard if the SS Norway wasn't there. Remember, Bangladash did not ban the SS Norway because of the Asbestos. They ban the ship because they did not want the controversy that came with the ship. Who in their right mind would allow the world to see the breakup of a ship that is loved the world over illegaly?

The SS Norway was the ship that started the Maga Cruise ship trend. A trend that shows no signs of ending anytime soon. Without her to lead the way at that time, I don't believe the cruise ship industry would evolve into the status that it now enjoys.

It is for that reason alone the SS Norway deserves to be saved and preserved. Instead, Star Cruises, a company that started in either 1992 or 1994, has the nerve to throw this ship away. Lord know what would have happened if they ever got their hands on Cunard. The QE2 would have been on the beach. Not sure if the ship has over 1240 tons of asbestos as the SS Norway. I'll pray for the SS Norway safe return out of Indian territory.

Has anyone seen this site???
http://www.ssnorway.no/index.html

S/S Norway Web auction - Major stuff from S/S Norway for sale over the WEB. For real or a scam???

For the moment, nothing is to be sold until permission to breakup the ship is given. I hope that permission is NOT given. So for now, this seller can't officially sell anything until a Court decision is decided in December 4th.

How sad to see the SS Monterey beached, she still looks in wonderful condition! Why did they do this?
It's such a shame to lose such a beautiful liner!!

MercuryQueen,

she apparently had a boiler problem MSC did not consider worth repairing. This particular scrapping really makes me sick as otherwise she was in pristine condition even on her final cruise.

quote:

...However the environmental questions are resolved, a mystery still surrounds how the Norway came to leave Europe. The European Union bans member countries from exporting hazardous waste to poor countries.

Nonetheless, in May 2005, the Norway was able to leave the German port of Bremerhaven, where it had been towed after the Miami explosion.


Environmentalists accuse Star Cruises Ltd., the Malaysia-based owner of the Norway, of concocting a cover story that it intended to reconstruct the ship in Malaysia as a hotel or training ship. A German state government minister said he believed that that was the reason the ship was being towed to Malaysia.


Miami-based Norwegian Cruise Lines, a Star Cruises subsidiary that operated the Norway, denied that its parent had misrepresented the Norway's likely future to the German government. In a statement, Norwegian said Star Cruises hadn't decided to scrap the ship when it left Germany and had continued to look for a buyer until December.


But a July 2005 letter from lawyers for Norwegian to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission seems to contradict that, saying Star Cruises decided in late 2004 that "the most likely scenario for disposal of the ship would be sale for salvage."

THIS part of the article says it all. Star/NCL is a bunch of scumbags who for all but the incredibly naive, or those who live with their head in a hole of denial, are nothing but a bunch of environmental CRIMINALS IMHO. They almost certainly PLANNED to put this farce into execution, and the levels of deceit and subterfuge they employed labels them, beyond any shadow of a doubt, as a soulless entity that is NOT deserving of the loyalty from ANY of its former customers who felt any level of attachment to this classic and erstwhile beautiful liner.

As for me, I stick to my guns... NCL/Star can go to hell in a handbasket, and it will suit me just fine.

A2K

Wow! A very harsh and powerful article, again authored by partisans, I'll assume. Could you have at least posted the url?
Let's review the many points made.

quote:

Miami-based Norwegian Cruise Lines, a Star Cruises subsidiary that operated the Norway, denied that its parent had misrepresented the Norway's likely future to the German government. In a statement, Norwegian said Star Cruises hadn't decided to scrap the ship when it left Germany and had continued to look for a buyer until December 2005.
But a July 2005 letter from lawyers for Norwegian to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission seems to contradict that, saying Star Cruises decided in late 2004 that "the most likely scenario for disposal of the ship would be sale for salvage."

So it's a crime for someone at NCL to be realistic? Likely Scenario, which eventually became true, doesn't mean any decisions what they were going to do with the Norway had been made at this time. The fact it took them a whole year to make a sale to scrappers indicates, at least to me, that they were looking for other buyers.

quote:

Environmentalists accuse Star Cruises Ltd., the Malaysia-based owner of the Norway, of concocting a cover story that it intended to reconstruct the ship in Malaysia as a hotel or training ship. A German state government minister said he believed that that was the reason the ship was being towed to Malaysia.

Even Maritime News reported that a Malaysia party was interested in buying the Norway. I guess the news really are rumors at Maritime News after all.

quote:

However the environmental questions are resolved, a mystery still surrounds how the Norway came to leave Europe. The European Union bans member countries from exporting hazardous waste to poor countries.

MSC must have broken the same law. The SS Monterey has arrived at Alang, awaiting an uncertain faith. But I don't recall reading it had been in any European yard recently, having its abestos and other hazardous wastes removed.
Please don't suggest that the SS Monterey built three decades before the Norway doesn't have any abestos aboard.

Why is it legal for MSC to dispose a old cruise ship laden with hazardous wastes, while at the same time it's illegal for Star Cruises to do so?

I guess you'll have to add another cruise line to your don't sail ever again list.

Ron, If you had followed this thread a little closer, you would have realized that A2K was quoting from an article I had posted on page 162. The URL WAS posted as http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/world/15962802.htm

Later......

In case you missed it...

http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml?id=2154127n

quote:

Originally posted by Ron Clark:
Wow! A very harsh and powerful article, again authored by partisans, I'll assume.

We all know what "ASSUME" can suggest, now don't we???

WOW! an effort at spin from the most consistent apologist for everything NCL/STAR seems to have brought upon itself... what a shocker! And WOW! perhaps the San Jose "Mercury" is, how did you put it? Partisan? From perusing through the site, I did find articles about everything from the unfortunate case of former 49'ers Coach Bill Walsh, to the potential move of the Niners to Santa Clara? (Real "eye-opening" partisan stuff here!!!) and then there are the traffic reports from South Bay Routes, Peninsula Routes, and East Bay Routes, or the general news about Alameda County? Ohhh, and there's that VERY suspicious "local weather" link up there with that indication of isolated rain, a high of 60, and low of 42--heaven only knows what sort of "partisans" that link will take you to!! Why I'd bet that "Subscribe to Services" is really a hidden phishing site, perhaps plants a cookie, all run by someone from a competing cruise line??? Although I seriously doubt there are a lot of cruises emanating from San Jose, seeing as it's hardly a port at all, then again, it IS after all only about a 30-60 minute ride (depends on traffic) south of San Francisco which IS a port with cruises from, well, Cunard, Princess, I think maybe there's even an RCCL ship lurking around--didn't see anyhing from NCL, tho' but who knows? Maybe what we all need to do to lighten up is chime in with a few verses from "Do you know the way to San Jose? I've been away so long, I may go wrong and lose my way?..." (good song, Dionne Warwick if memory serves me correctly.)
Ya just never know. All this "newspaper" stuff could be just another front for Royal Carribean, or maybe Carnival Lines??? Perhaps... but in all likelihood, it is just what it appears to be, a website for a very much "NON-PARTISAN" NEWSPAPER! Really, Ron, your shrill response on this one does little to advance the credibility of your position on the matter. Had Remarc not come in and stolen some of my thunder (no offense intended Remarc, I'm just making a point.) I'm sure you'd have tapped that usual "How do we know that..... yada yada yada..." line for everything it's worth--which quite frankly isn't much!

quote:

So it's a crime for someone at NCL to be realistic?

Straw man and you know it. Nobody said that at all, it is your attempt, as usual, to implant words into peoples' mouths and to try to offer your own brand of "partisan" spin on the story.

quote:

Likely Scenario, which eventually became true, doesn't mean any decisions what they were going to do with the Norway had been made at this time. The fact it took them a whole year to make a sale to scrappers indicates, at least to me, that they were looking for other buyers.

Ummm, "doesn't mean this.... might've been that...." the "how do you know..." never seems to end does it? And while it's 'usually' a valid question, the mounting evidence makes its use here seem quite feeble. The "partisan" article does seem to refer to documents that suggest the decision to "scrap" was made considerably earlier than this. Scrappers are, when all is said and done, "buyers", ya know... it's just that with the nasty terms of BASEL and BAN in the way, it simply fascilitates matters a whole lot better to employ subterfuge and vaguaries when simply posting that it's for "sale". Yes you might argue the worn out "How do you know..." (YAWN!) contention--for the umpteenth time; but the evidence is decidedly NOT in the favor of NCL/Star Cruises, try as you may to spin all the "possibilities." Oh, they exist, I grant you that much-- but there is validity...and then again their is "more than likely"... and all the documentation from these nasty "partisans" I've perused are decidedly in favor of the conclusion that from the get-go, the departure from Bremerhaven was purely a fraudulent concoction (as per the "partisan" news source), of NCL/Star to EVADE International Law--and YES, "in MY book"..(as I clearly stated IMHO), that makes them little more than corporate criminals.

quote:

Even Maritime News reported that a Malaysia party was interested in buying the Norway. I guess the news really are rumors at Maritime News after all.

Oh, so now you're going to quote one of those "partisan" sources? Then I suppose we can all engage in the appeal to ignorance game once again and suggest that YES, even Maritime News can have been MISSLED by the verbal BILGE coming from corporate headquarters in their efforts to flout international treaties and laws--yeah, I think that quite possible.

quote:

MSC must have broken the same law. The SS Monterey has arrived at Alang, awaiting an uncertain faith. But I don't recall reading it had been in any European yard recently, having its abestos and other hazardous wastes removed.
Please don't suggest that the SS Monterey built three decades before the Norway doesn't have any abestos aboard.

Diversion... Non-Sequitur. Can't let ya get away with that one. Two wrongs still don't make a right in MY book. That said for whatever it's worth, I sincerely doubt the Monterey has remotely the tonnage of hazardous waste that the Norway has--and THAT said, I reiterate emphatically that this is a non-sequitur as it detracts NOTHING at all from what Star/NCL has pulled off in their apparently deceitful and at the very least ostensibly gross missmanagement of the Norway's dispersal--none whatsoever; but I'll give you E for "effort" at attempting a diversion.

quote:

Why is it legal for MSC to dispose a old cruise ship laden with hazardous wastes, while at the same time it's illegal for Star Cruises to do so?

Another attempt to pursue a red-herring. --just doesn't wash. I didn't read a single post suggesting that what MSC has done is legal at all. Have you? If so please direct me to it; albeit, once again, however much you try to tie these two together, they do NOT have any effect whatsoever on mitigating the nefarious conduct of NCL/Star or their wretched disregard for international law and just plain human decency in their handling of the Norway. If you wish to have us place MSC into the same league--go for it. But it changes nothing, now, does it?

quote:

I guess you'll have to add another cruise line to your don't sail ever again list.

Possibly, yet I must reiterate THAT is NOT the central issue here, now is it?--but once again...nice try! Star/NCL still very much deserves the contempt it has rightfully earned from quite literally--millions.

A2K

quote:

Originally posted by Remarc:
In case you missed it...

http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml?id=2154127n

Powerful piece there, Remarc. It certainly does shed a LOT of light on just how sad the plight is for the workers at these kinds of places, (notice they employ "children"?) Perhaps a few lines to 60 minutes elaborating on the NORWAY are in order... wouldn't it be great if CBS picked up on the whole debacle leading up to Alang? I'm sure the folks at NCL would get their "spin" machine in high gear!

My e-mail has already been sent--lets try to get in a few more. Oh, and lest anyone take this out of context, I readily admit it'll have little bearing on the outcome of Norway's fate as I'd disclosed a LONG time ago that I felt this was already a fait accompli (may they rot in hell), but it will, perhaps, go a long way in our Norway's little bit of "revenge" on the deceitful wretches that orchestrated this farce.

And it just MIGHT send a message to certain "scavengers" that folks actually are "doing" what is within their meager means to have their say, and at the very least have some sort of effect delivering consequences for irresponsible actions on some well deserving heads.

A2K

Well said A2K,
Did you know that Reuben's website was attacked again? If the courts were going to favor the breakup of the SS Norway, why should they worry about the SS Maritime website?

This is just a guess; I believe that based on all of the evidence received by the Indian Supreme Court, as well as international pressure and local concerns in India, it might force the court's hands to ban the SS Norway from Indian territorial waters. It'll be very difficult for the scrappers to argue otherwise.

Another reason, at least according to Reuben, is there are 2-3 interested parties who have the resources to buy the SS Norway and are willing to take on the responsibility to safely remove the asbestos from the ship.

But as you said, we'll have to wait and see what happens when the court returns with its decision December 4th.

If the Indian Shipbreakers want to continue their way of life with their usual business practices, they should let the SS Norway go. Otherwise they'll come big changes in their industry that will put a lot of them out of business if they go ahead and scrap this ship. This is a very big test for the Indian government. To go against their own laws with the world watching would be a very grave mistake. This is the reason why Bangladash banned the SS Norway.

This is the kind of attention that no shipbreaker wants. Since the SS Monterey is on the beach, they should concentrate their attention on that ship because it doesn't have the same level of controversy as the SS Norway.

Here ya go... all you Norway Fans, and folks who wish to see a modicum of justice at the very least "investigated"... the following link;

CBS 60 minutes Shipbreaking link

will take you to the exact article--the video is also there as well. By scrolling to the bottom, you will find a statement in RED that states "Comments are closed for this story" HOWEVER, there is another link right under that titled: "ContactCBSNews.com", which opens a window so that you might use the provided menus to select a message for 60 minutes, and provide your insights on the DEPLORABLE conduct of NCL in its handling of this ship from Miami in 2003, to Bremerhaven last year, to Alang currently. If, when you should hit "submit" you get a message suggesting an error occurred, or that your message was not successful--fear not. Be certain you highlight and "copy" your message before you hit submit... then simply go through the process again.. it took me two tries... but I finally got a "Thank you, your message has been sent to our investigative teams" message.

Perhaps a BUNCH of these messages to 60 minutes, or CBS might just launch a further investigation into all the machinations put into place by these soulless entities that flout international law amd human decency in seeking their ends.

A2K

Echo...echo...echo...

Sorry about the repeat folks... thought I was "editing" the previous post, and it only doubled up... well perhaps it's just as well, might bear double scrutiny... amd I do know how to spell "and"...

Of course we all know this is an NCL conspiracy!

A2K

Very interesting reportage indeed (CBS shipbreaking reportage). It's sad to see such misery, people, pollution...

quote:

Nikhil Gupta, secretary of the Ship Recycling Industries Association (India), says that safety practices have improved at the ship breaking yards in Alang, India.

Yeah right. If the Indian Supreme Court are stupid enough to believe a word that these scrappers owners are saying about their improved safety practices, they'll believe anything. Improvements cost money. Money which these scrappers have no intention of investing in.

Honestly, they should let the SS Norway go. This way no one would care what happens to the Indian ship juckyard workers. I don't know of anyone who wants this kind of attention.

And Star Cruises are not faring very either. For the past six months, they have lost close to US$60 Million. To deny the world this wonderful ship for preservation is criminal at best. They picked the wrong ship to want to scrap and got away with it.

This is an important court case, because if the court says 'YES' to the breakup, it will open the floodgates for more ships to be dumped at the Alang shipyard. And India will look like a fool for breaking its own laws with the world watching. So this is a test to see if India will follow on its obligations or break them. Either way, I hope that the ship can be saved. But I'll believe that when I see it. Breaking up the SS Norway will not solve the problems that Alang is facing. If they want to recover, they'll have to diversify their interest in other areas.

The SS Monterey is on the beach. And no one in the media is concentrating their coverage on that ship. If the SS Norway manage to get banned from India, interest in the Alang juckyard(as far as the international press coverage is concerned), will greatly diminished. And they could go back to what they'll always done. But only if they let the SS Norway go.

Ron what do you mean 30 years,the Montery was built in 1952 and S/S France (S/S Norway) 1962 thats ten years not 30 and they Montery is also much smaller than S/S Norway so the amount of asbetous is much less and NO I don't think what MSC did was right and I will never sail on them either.If you want to talk and make a point. Get your facts right!!!!

Has anyone seen the comments made by Peter toward Rueben we can see whose side Peter is one and it's not ours.

Can anyone tell me what happened to the Monterey's sister - the Mariposa ? I remember seeing them in Sydney when they used to sail from San Francisco to Sydney - went on board the Mariposa many times... they were very stylish ships.

Greetings from Sydney...

Aussie Cruiser,

Check out Mariposa at... http://web.greatships.net:81/mariposa2.html

Have a great day.