Mein Schiff 3 accidents and incidents

10 July 2022Other Incidents

On July 10, 2022, during the scheduled visit to Longyearbyen (Spitsbergen Island, Svalbard Norway) the cruise ship embarked as passengers 100+ people stranded on the island. Mein Schiff 3 disembarked the new passengers in Tromso on July 13th.

Due to Scandinavian Airlines’ pilot strike (starting on July 3rd), only Norwegian Air offered regularly scheduled flights to the Svalbard Archipelago, resulting in less capacity for locals and tourists traveling to mainland Norway or returning to their home countries. This also stranded many cruise tourists in Longyearbyen.

Mein Schiff 3 operated a 14-day "Norwegen Mit Spitzbergen" voyage (itinerary July 3-17, roundtrip from Bremerhaven, Germany) visiting Norway's ports Stavanger, Bergen, Hellesylt, Geiranger, Longyearbyen-Spitsbergen (port stay 9 am - 9 pm), Honningsvag (Mageroya Island), Tromso, and Alesund.

May 2020Cruise Illness / Virus Outbreaks

(Coronavirus) On May 1, 2020, TUI Cruises confirmed that on Schiff 3, one male crew tested positive for COVID-19 (Coronavirus). Reportedly, he was showing only mild symptoms. The man was medevaced and isolated (hospitalized) in HELIOS Klinik Cuxhaven. However, rumours from the onboard crew suggested 3 cases, which was not confirmed by TUI. The berthed ship was then quarantined.

At the time, Schiff 3 was docked at Port Cuxhaven (Lower Saxony, Germany) and carrying a total of 2899 staff-crew. This number was unusual as the liner has max crew capacity 1000. The additional personnel was due to crew transfers from two other TUI ships (Schiff 4, Schiff 6) to Schiff 3 for repatriation. Because of the great number of people on the vessel, proper isolation (1 person per cabin) was impossible as the ship has a total of 1253 staterooms.

In the evening on May 2, Cuxhaven police officers boarded the cruise liner after crew started a riot smashing furniture and complaining of "knastahnliche Zustande" (prison-like conditions). The police filed a complaint against 2 crew for property damage. Many of the crew (like waiters, musicians, etc) had no longer valid employment contracts with TUI, and were not been paid for weeks.

On April 17-18, the ship made a technical stop (for fuelling and provisioning) in Port Santa Cruz de Tenerife (Canary Islands). According to TUI, to Schiff 3 was also transferred crew from 3 fleetmates (Schiff 1, Schiff 2,  Schiff Herz). The transfers were via the docking pier (direct crossings from ship to ship). On April 30th, from Schiff 3 disembarked 110 crew to travel to their home countries.

The announcement about the Coronavirus case was made by the Captain via the onboard PA (public address) system. The result followed tests conducted only on 15 crew who visited the Infirmary reporting mild flu-like symptoms. Cuxhaven District's health department immediately ordered COVID-19 tests and one of them was positive. The 15 crew were isolated in separate cabins. Followed testing of 229 crew who had closer contact with the infected. According to TUI, their results returned negative. On May 4, Cuxhaven's health authorities tested the entire crew. A total of 8 results returned positive. The 8 patients (without symptoms and feeling well) were disembarked and ambulanced to a Geestland clinic for a 14-day quarantine.

German medias reported inconsistencies in the patient's test results. The ship's senior physician carried out 2 tests - the first was positive, the second negative. A sample was then flown (via helicopter) to Hamburg and the laboratory there had a negative result. Only the test conducted by Cuxhaven's health office returned positive again.

On May 5, in Cuxhaven docked the fleetmate Schiff 6, carrying a total of 254 crew. TUI planned ~1200 healthy crew from Schiff 3 to be repatriated (via charter flights on May 8 and May 11) to Indonesia and Ukraine. A charter flight was organized for TUI's crew from Tunisia, Turkey and Mauritius, and another charter flight repatriated all the TUI's Chinese crew. On May 8, ~190 crew were bused to Hamburg Airport, from where on May 9 started repatriation flights (with TUIfly aircraft) to Kiev (Ukraine) and Tunis (Tunisia). 

All TUI Cruises ships were without passengers after the company suspended fleetwide operations on March 23.