Luxury expedition cruise company Scenic Cruises has been forced to scrap it a five-month program of cruises scheduled for its 17,100-gt, 228-passenger polar cruiseship Scenic Eclipse because Croatian shipbuilder Uljanik is unable to deliver it on time.
Ordered in 2016, the Scenic Eclipse was supposed to have been delivered in August of this year. It was scheduled to set off on an inaugural series of cruises covering the Mediterranean, Atlantic, South America and Antarctica.
The ship will instead begin service on 28 January on a cruise from Argentina to Antarctica.
Scenic founder and chairman Glen Moroney blames construction issues for the delay.
“Despite the best efforts of our build supervision team to make up construction time, we are not prepared to compromise the quality of the vessel and potentially impact guest experiences to meet the original launch date,” Moroney said in a statement to the travel trade.
Well-placed industry insiders attribute the construction issues to the Uljanik’s financial issues over the past winter and the subsequent restructuring that resulted in Kermas Energija taking majority ownership at the end of March this year.
Despite these problems Scenic returned to Uljanik in February this year with an order for a second ship that is scheduled for delivery in 2020.
TradeWinds understands that the construction issues that plagued Uljanik were resolved subsequent to its restructuring, and that no delays are expected for the second Scenic ship.
Kermas Energija, owned by Croatian businessman and shipyard owner Danko Koncar, came on board as a strategic partner in Uljanik after the Croatian government agreed to give the yard a EUR 96m loan on the condition that it bring in an equity partner.
