Royal Caribbean Settles Dispute with Rolls Royce

« Older: Keel of Carnival Magic Laid Newer: Having the Winter Blues? »

Seatrade Insider is reporting that Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. has reached an amicable settlement with Rolls-Royce in its long-running lawsuit over the Mermaid pods on Celebrity’s Millennium-class ships.

When first designed and implemented, podded propulsion was a significant technological advance over traditional shaft propulsion, but there were a number of technical issues in the early years of use.

Mermaid pods are installed on four Celebrity ships, Millennium, Summit, Infinity and Constellation. Over the years, a number of cruises were disrupted or canceled due to pod issues.

Royal Caribbean filed a $300m lawsuit against Alstom and Rolls-Royce in 2003, alleging pod defects. Alstom subsequently settled with RCL for $38m.

In late 2008, Carnival Corp. & plc sued Rolls-Royce and Converteam (Alstom Power Conversion) seeking $100m in alleged damages related to the Mermaid system on Cunard Line’s Queen Mary 2.