Aloha Pacific Cruises - SS Monterey

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With Reuben Goossens

Maritime Historian, Cruise‘n’Ship Reviewer & Author

Aloha Pacific Cruises

SS Monterey’s

Sad & final days of cruising the America’s

Aloha Pacific Cruises

Having been laid up since 1979, Monterey was towed to Portland Oregon as she was to be transformed at a cost of $40 million into a full time cruise ship for Aloha Pacific Cruises, but she was registered under American Maritime Holdings. She was transferred to a Tacoma, Washington shipyard in order to commence work as required to allow her to remain under American registry. However, with the approval of the Maritime Administration, she was sent off to the Wartsila's ship yard in Turku Finland, to have most of her interior work completed.

Monterey seen at the Finnish Wartsila Shipyards at Turku where she was rebuilt for Aloha Pacific Cruises

Wartsila Shipyards

Tragically, the once well balanced Monterey received major external transformations, which horrified all who knew her from her Matson, Pacific Far East days. As many put it, “she was disfigured” with the addition of a huge aircraft carrier style lido platform above her stern, in addition, Promenade deck was extended far forward of the bridge, cutting off most of her foredeck. Both the stern and forward additions added a considerable number of new cabins.

The SS Monterey seen in August of 1988 while she was in dry dock at Bethlehem Steel's Sparrows Point shipyard Maryland for 10 days of painting

Photograph by Mr. Dino Corti the ships official photographer for the “Kodak Cruise Service”

After re rebuilding she undertook a 46-night maiden cruise from Copenhagen on July 31, 1988 from Copenhagen to San Francisco. This was followed by a 26-night cruise from New York to San Francisco. Monterey commenced her seven day Hawaiian cruise duties from Honolulu in September.

When the 350 happy cruisers aboard the SS Monterey set sail from San Francisco for a Hawaiian Islands tour in September 1988, they didn't suspect that the demand for Pepto-Bismol might be greater than that for Dramamine. The luxury liner sailed with uncorrected food sanitation violations that were in marked contrast to its promotional literature, which boasted of “innovative cuisine with a hint of French and Hawaiian flair … exquisitely prepared . . . by chefs trained in some of America's finest restaurants and culinary institutes.”

The rest of this page has been taken from a report regarding the FDA situation on the ship, which gave her a bad name from the very beginning, and she never regained her previous popularity that she had with Matson or Pacific Far East Lines!

“The ship left port the evening of Sept. 16, 1988, even though a letter of warning had been hand-delivered hours earlier from FDA's San Francisco office that had advised the captain that the vessel should not carry passengers until food sanitation problems had been corrected.

Please Note: The FDA is the Food and Drug Administration who inspects all U.S. flagged passenger liners that are under the Interstate Travel Sanitation Regulations, issued under the Public Health Service Act.

A recent refurbishing of the vessel in Finland, costing the liner's operator, Aloha Pacific Cruises, Inc., roughly US$40 million, had included a major overhaul of the galley, but the work was incomplete, and the ship took on passengers with the shipyard's "riding crew" still aboard, still working on items such as plumbing and refrigeration. FDA investigators inspected the ship's food service facilities in August when the liner arrived in Baltimore Harbour from Finland to undergo some additional structural work, and again while it was en route to Newport News, Va. Major sanitation deficiencies uncovered in Baltimore prohibited granting the ship either a certificate of sanitation or certificate of sanitary construction.

Furthermore, because the problems were not corrected before the ship left Baltimore on Aug. 25, FDA's Baltimore office notified its counterpart in San Francisco (where the ship was headed via Fort Lauderdale, the Panama Canal, San Diego, and Los Angeles) requesting that the vessel be inspected upon its arrival in that city.

Docked at Pier 35 in San Francisco, the Monterey underwent another FDA inspection Sept. 15 and 16 during which inspectors found that conditions since leaving Baltimore had not changed. Among other things, the investigators found that:

* Refrigerators were not cold enough to control bacterial growth in foods.

* Blood from thawing meats was draining onto trays of vegetables.

* Dishwasher water was too cold to sterilize dishes.

* Food was stored on floors in walk-in refrigerators.

* Water drained onto galley floors from sinks not connected to drain lines.

* The disinfection system for the drinking water was not working properly.

Inspectors also noted that the crew was less than meticulous in following the most basic hygienic practices to prevent food contamination--neither hand soap nor towels were seen at any of the galley stations. Furthermore, according to the ship's health log, 10 crew members--including two who worked in the galley--and three paying passengers had had diarrhoea. However, the cause of the diarrhoea was not established.

On Sept. 22, while the ship, despite FDA's letter, was en route to Honolulu, FDA representatives met at the Department of Justice in Washington, D.C., with the president of Aloha Pacific Cruises and the firm's lawyer. The firm claimed that all the sanitation violations cited by FDA in San Francisco had been corrected. FDA decided, however, to inspect the ship again before it docked in Hawaii and, if conditions were still insanitary, to request that the U.S. attorney in Honolulu seek a temporary restraining order to keep the ship from its island tour.

FDA and the Department of Justice both wanted the ship inspected before it docked in Honolulu because more passengers were to embark there. FDA considered requesting the Coast Guard to assist in putting inspectors aboard by helicopter or a launch from a cutter, but consultation with the Coast Guard indicated that would have endangered both the FDA investigators and the Coast Guard crews involved.

So, FDA San Francisco investigator Randall Zielinski (who followed the ship from his home district) and Honolulu resident post investigator Robert Howell got special authorization to go out on the harbour pilot's boat to meet the Monterey. They reached the liner about an hour before it docked in Honolulu Sept. 23.

Zielinski and Howell again found sanitation violations, which they documented with photos. Among the first people off the ship in Honolulu's port, the FDA investigators immediately had colour prints developed from the film at a local one-hour photo lab and delivered the evidence to the U.S. attorney's office in Honolulu. Armed with these prints and others taken during the San Francisco inspection, and with the FDA-prepared complaint and supporting affidavits, the assistant U.S. attorney sought a temporary restraining order to stop food service operations on the ship. The complaint for injunction named as defendants Monterey Limited Partnership (the ship's owner); Aloha Pacific Cruises, Inc.; James L. Kurtz, chief executive officer; Morten L. Mathiesen, executive director of hotel operations; and Captain Adrian Jennings, the ship's captain.

Zielinski testified for more than two hours at the hearing, using the colour photos to describe conditions aboard ship that could lead to contamination of food and possible illness among the passengers. The ship's doctor testified that there had been no more cases of diarrhoea on board since the ship left San Francisco.

At the close of the hearing, federal Judge Harold M. Fong said he was convinced that although some improvements had been made since the Baltimore and San Francisco inspections, the ship remained in poor sanitary condition. He allowed the Monterey to continue its interisland cruise with food service, but, waving the photographs at the defendants, ordered them to correct the violations or face penalties for contempt. He then issued an injunction requiring them to do so.

On Sept. 27, FDA re-inspected the ship while it was anchored at Lahaina on the Hawaiian island of Maui and reported that galley conditions had greatly improved and no longer posed a health hazard. Nevertheless, plumbing deficiencies still prohibited the vessel from qualifying for certification, and unacceptable sanitation conditions persisted. By July 1989, the defendants still had not filed their answer to the complaint for injunction.

On July 20, 1989, the U.S. attorney's office filed a motion for default judgment against Aloha Pacific Cruises, Inc., Kurtz, Mathiesen and Jennings, based on the original injunction complaint to keep them from serving food until the sanitation violations were corrected. The court entered the default that same day, but, as of this writing, has not imposed a permanent injunction as requested by the government.

A footnote to this sea saga is the question: What is to be the fate of the Monterey, which has lain idle in Honolulu Harbour since May 1989? According to an article in The Honolulu Advertiser, federal Judge Samuel King last November granted a motion to auction off the luxury liner, despite a protest by its bankrupt owner, the SS Monterey Limited Partnership. Judge King, noting the $30,000 to $40,000 needed to maintain the ship each week, judged the vessel too valuable to let deteriorate while several major legal issues surrounding it were settled.

If the vessel sails again in U.S.-flag service, FDA Interstate Travel Sanitation specialists will re-inspect it to protect the health of interstate travellers. As of this writing, no successful bidder had appeared, and the ship was tied up in Honolulu.”

The Monterey is seen here in Genoa in early September 2006 just prior her voyage to India, when she was renamed “Monte.”

Photographer unknown – see photo notes below!

After her disastrous time with Aloha Pacific, she was first sold to “Coral Cruises” and then she was resold again to “Naviera Panocean” of Panama. However, thankfully she then found a new home in Italy an she sailed on for 20 good years with Star Lauro (ex Flotta Lauro Lines) that later became MSC Cruises, and obviously she was a huge success. But sadly she was eventually sold to the Indian breakers and the superb SS Monterey was beached at Alang India on Wednesday November 8, 2006 to be broken up!

INDEX

Page One … The Matson / Pacific Far East Line (PFEL) Liners - this page

Page Two … Matson / PFEL photo album

Page Three … Matson / PFEL cabin plan

New Page … Aloha Pacific Cruises’ Monterey 1987 to 1988

Page Four … Monterey as a Star Lauro / MSC Cruises cruise ship

Page Five … Monterey – MSC- photographs from various sources

Page Six … Monterey – MSC - an excellent series of photographs by Johan Coeman

Page Seven … Monterey – MSC – Cabin Plan

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