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Article: Lives of the liners: Msc & cruising

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    Lives of the liners: Msc & cruising

    2 Comments by Doc Vernon Published on 3rd July 2017 09:26 AM



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    May 31stManhattan: Italian-owned but Swiss-headquartered Mediterranean ShippingCo, best known as MSC, is a powerhouse, no a steam roller, in worldwideshipping. After acquiring aged, second hand freighters back in the '70s,they sensibly re-adapted and went headfirst into full containershipping. It all worked -- good, intuitive management plus low,competitive rates. Today, MSC owns over 400 container ships, someat the top carrying as many as 19,000 containers, and overall rank as the 2ndlargest container line in the world (only Denmark's Maersk Line isbigger).

    But back in 1990s, MSC also invested in cruising -- then mostly in theMediterranean -- with several older, smallish ships. Well, more success,then great success, then huge success -- today, MSC Cruises owns 13modern cruise liners, some in the 200,000-ton, 5,000-passengerrange. And this cruise arm has expanded beyond the Med to worldwideservices -- departing from the likes of Copenhagen, Rio, Cape Town, Dubai andShanghai.

    Today,it was a sort of close-up of MSC. On the 37th floor of a midtownskyscraper, I gave a talk on the general history of Mediterranean passengerships, but mostly Italian liners -- starting from the '30s glamor of the Rex& Conte di Savoia to the '50s post-war renaissance and modernity of thelikes of Giulio Cesare, Andrea Doria & Ausonia. I thenwent onward, flashing photos on a $10,000 ultra-tech screen (it seemed youcould almost touch the ships), to the '60s boom era of the Leonardo daVinci, Guglielmo Marconi, Michelangelo, Oceanic, Eugenio C andothers. By conclusion, it was the current age of mega-ships, thosetowering, amenity-stacked Italian sea-going resorts, flying the house flags ofCosta and MSC.
    We sat,to a buffet lunch, in a huge boardroom: a cherry wood table the length ofChile, a huge model of an MSC containership off to the side and, in the shadowsof the Empire State Building (just three blocks away), panoramic windows thatfaced as far south as the Verrazano Bridge. The room was full,standing room only, as largely young, very bright, mostly Italians paid raptand courteous attention. A Q&A followed.
    Afinishing touch: Before leaving, we had a visit to Captain NickArena's huge, corner office. He worked (for almost thirty years)for the bygone Italian Line -- and in the glory days of the Augustus, DaVinci & Michelangelo. He well remembers the great and granddays of film stars and royalty traveling to and from Italy (and, with a stop atCannes, the French Riviera), summer tourists, the armies of Catholic priestsand nuns, and the immigrants, bound for new lives in the USA and in SouthAmerica. While palatial and spaciously comfortable, the Captain's officeis also his personal museum of, as it called them, "those great ships ofso many glorious memories". Shelves and walls were neatly stacked: A model of the Michelangelo, a Bill Muller painting of the Rex,lots of certificates and commemoratives and commendations and, of course, thepersonal photos: Pope John Paul II, Sophia Loren, the president ofItaly.
    Ourvisit, sponsored by the Propeller Club, also had the air of excitement. There was a hint of news, perhaps big news, coming. Well, by thetime, I returned home to New Jersey, MSC had announced a $10 billion stack oforders for no less than 7 more cruise ships, all to be built in France and atleast two of which will hit the 200,000-ton mark and carry nearly 6,900passengers, the highest capacities yet.
    Yes, avery interesting day in the offices of one of the world's biggest and busiestshipowners. And yes, there's lots more to come from MSC.
    Photos: Memory lane mostly --Italian Line's Augustus, Leonardo da Vinci & the sisters Michelangelo& Raffaello; last is the new, innovative MSC Seaside,to be introduced next December
    ; and the upcoming MSC World Class.
    Senior Site Moderator-Member and Friend of this Website

    R697530

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    Default Re: Lives of the liners: Msc & cruising

    Vernon
    Interesting article that. When they first appeared on the scene everyone thought that MSC stood for MAFIA SHIPPING COMPANY as they seemed to come out of nowhere to suddenly become a major player in the Container industry. Initially they started off on routes, avoiding major hubs concentrating on servicing new routes they developed. All their vessels they started out with were 2nd and 3rd generation container tonnage and some were even geared in order to be capable of self discharging at ports that had no container cranes.
    All their early ships seemed at one time to end up in Antwerp dry docks where they would use imported labour to completely refurbish them with major engine overhauls, massive amounts of steel renewals to hulls and deck along with completely shot blasting hull and at times accommodation before re-painting them.
    I was often in the locks with one of them in Le Havre and there was always at least one in dry dock in Antwerp where we would be at least 3 times a month.
    Being in the locks with them gave us a chance to be up close with them and many of them were pretty rubbish looking with a motley crowd of crews, mainly eastern European. I was told that if the vessel was named after a girl,e.g. MSC Caroline, it was owned, vessels named after countries were time or bare boat charters.
    rgds
    JA

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    Default Re: Lives of the liners: Msc & cruising

    John , MSC has a terrible safety record, with groundings and collisions. There was a box boat broke in half a few years ago of the Brighton coast, containers were floating ashore and many had BMW motorcycles in them. Wish I had lived local has folk were helping themselves under the mis apprehension that it was a free for all.
    One was also recently involved in a major collision incident. Two months ago a young first trip cadet was sadly killed in Antwerp. The kid had been on board only 4 hours and the duty officer sent him out on deck unsupervised to get something, details have to date not been released but it was a box boat so one can only assume the poor kid was crushed to death. As you say they employ poor quality crews, the rejects no one else wants.

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