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Cruise line
switching to ship
with no casino

Norwegian Cruise Line
originally looked to base
a gambling ship here

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By Russ Lynch
Star-Bulletin

Norwegian Cruise Line will bring a new cruise liner, with no casino on board, to Hawaii in December.

Far from being stymied by a new federal law that would have kept it from basing its 2-year-old, 1,960-passenger SuperStar Leo in Honolulu because it has a casino, the Miami-based cruise line today said it is switching ships.

Now it will base the $400 million, 91,000-ton, 2,200-passenger SuperStar Libra in Honolulu. The ship is still under construction, and the company said it was less expensive to alter the plans now and not install a casino than it would have been to take the casino out of the other ship.

In any case, Norwegian Cruise Line said, the positive reaction from travelers and travel agents to its plan to base a ship in Hawaii justifies using the bigger vessel.

The new ship, being built in Germany, was intended for Norwegian Cruise parent Star Cruises. Now it will start round-the-islands cruises Dec. 16 for Norwegian Cruise Line under a new name, the Norwegian Star.

To comply with a law that prevents foreign-built ships from carrying passengers between American ports, each of the Norwegian Star's voyages will include a stop at Fanning Island, about 1,200 miles south of Honolulu in the Republic of Kiribati.

The company is taking the position that the foreign call makes each voyage an international trip, not a domestic one.

That law dates back to the early 1900s. The latest law, which Hawaii Sen. Daniel K. Inouye had inserted into a bigger measure that passed in December, posed a bigger threat because it does not allow any cruise line to start and end a voyage in Hawaii if it has gaming equipment aboard.

The measure drew criticism from Gov. Ben Cayetano as potentially harmful to the burgeoning Hawaii cruise business and from others who saw it as a step to protect American Classic Voyages Inc., whose American Hawaii Cruises and United States Lines subsidiaries are operating in Hawaii.

United States Lines plans to put a new U.S.-built 1,900-passenger liner to work in Hawaiian waters in 2003 and another in 2004.

Colin Veitch, Norwegian Cruise Lines president and chief executive officer, said today that its initial announcement about basing a ship in Hawaii drew a "strongly positive reaction from both cruisers and travel agents."

"In looking at the potential demand for this market, we made the decision to utilize a larger and absolutely brand-new ship," Veitch said. The Norwegian Star will be the company's largest ship and will carry a crew of 1,100, traveling as fast as 25 knots, he said.

One of the ship's 10 restaurants will have a Hawaiian theme, and another will serve Japanese cuisine, with a sit-up sushi and tempura bar. An indoor-outdoor buffet 130 yards long will spread along more than one-third of the deck.