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Last trip after 42 years for former “Song of America”

Built in 1982, renamed several times, decommissioned in 2023: The former “Song of America”, a cruise oldie built in Finland, has completed its last voyage and is now being scrapped.

It is a piece of the early history of the American cruise line Royal Caribbean. Now the ship was beached for scrapping in Alang, India, last weekend.

Last sailing under the name “Fortu”, the cruise ship, built as the “Song of America”, was something special not only for the shipping company, but also for the emerging cruise business at the time.

Until it was decommissioned in the fall of 2023 by the Greek shipping company Celestyal Cruises, the third-largest cruise ship at the time of delivery was almost always in its original condition, and even the Viking Crown Lounge on the smokestack, which was a distinctive feature of the earlier Royal ships, was retained.

In 1982, the “Song of America”, measuring 37,584 GRT, was put into service at the Finnish Wärtsilä shipyard in Helsinki under construction number 431 as the shipping company’s fourth ship – although a sister ship was never commissioned. At the beginning of the 1970s, Royal Caribbean launched the much smaller sister ships, the 168-metre-long “Sun Viking”, “Nordic Prince” and “Song of Norway” with a tonnage of around 18,346 GRT and a passenger capacity for 700 guests.

Following the great success of the Caribbean cruises, a program to increase capacity by “lengthening” the existing ships was commissioned. However, while the first two ships “Nordic Prinse” and “Song of Norway” were still being extended by a 26 m long middle section, the Wartsila shipyard approached Royal Caribbean’s management with plans for a completely new and modern ship concept. They were met with approval. As a result, the extension of the third ship, the “Sun Viking”, was suspended and the shipyard was awarded the construction contract for the later “Song of America”.

The “Song of America” was 214.5 m long, 28.41 m wide and had a capacity for around 1,575 passengers in 724 cabins. On delivery, the ship was still registered in Norway, with Norwegian officers and an international crew. Among those on board on its maiden voyage were former US President Jimmy Carter, who had only recently passed away, and his wife Rosalyn. In terms of size, it was the third largest cruise ship of its time; only the former transatlantic liner “Norway” (70,202 GRT) and “Queen Elizabeth 2” (83,673 GRT) were larger at the time.

Innovative elements

There were some innovative features. For the first time, this ship was surrounded by the “Viking Crown”, the trademark of many of the shipping company’s ships: completely surrounding the funnel, it offered passengers a 360-degree view. The pool area was the largest ever built on a cruise ship at the time and comprised two pools. For the first time, the majority of the passenger cabins were placed further forward in the ship and the public areas further back, so that the cabins were further away from the noisy ship engines.

However, the size of the passenger cabins, which at 12 square meters were criticized as being far too small, caused a lot of criticism at the time. However, a compromise had to be made when planning the ship in order to achieve a significant increase in the size of the public areas compared to the competition. Especially as the ship was primarily planned for 7-day voyages in the Caribbean, so the plans were based on passengers spending the least amount of time in their cabins. Initially, the “Song of America” sailed classic Caribbean routes from Miami to Nassau, San Juan and St. Thomas. Later, voyages from New York to Bermuda were added to make the ship more attractive to a wider audience.

In May 1998, the ship was sold to Sun Cruises, which operated it as the “Sunbird” on the British market. In the summer, it was sold to Louis Cruise Lines, but was then chartered to Thomson Cruises until 2011, who operated it as the “Thomson Destiny”.

It was not until 2012 that Louis Cruise operated the ship itself, initially as the “Louis Olympia”. As part of the renaming of Louis Cruise Line to Celestyal Cruises, the ship was renamed “Celestyal Olympia” and operated in the Greek Aegean.

With the takeover of the former “Aidaaura” in fall 2023 as “Celestyal Discovery”, the “Celestyal Olympia” was decommissioned and sold to an investor. Initially renamed “Bella Fortuna”, the ship was launched in Turkey and later in the United Arab Emirates. Under the flag of the Comoros and the new name “Fortu”, the ship left the United Arab Emirates on January 22, 2025, heading for Alang in India, where she was beached for scrapping on February 1. (CE)

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Copyright: © Eckardt

Caption: The former "Celestyal Olympia" in a photo from 2015 (© Eckardt)