MS Pride of America is a cruise ship built in the United States and is operated byNorwegian Cruise Lines. Inaugurated during the 2005/2006 cruise season as the first new U.S.-flagged cruise ship in nearly fifty years, Pride of America was designed to pay homage to the spirit of the United States, from the patriotic artwork on the hull to the U.S.-themed public spaces.
History
For much of her early build history, Pride of America was known as Project America 1; the first of a pair of 70,000 ton cruise ships to be built at the Litton-Ingalls shipyard in Mississippi with heavy federal subsidies. Project America was intended as a means of improving the competitiveness of American shipyards in performing commercial construction, as well as creating the first U.S.-registered passenger ships of any real size in decades. Project America program collapsed in 2001, when American Classic Voyages, the company that was to operate the ships under its United States Lines division, filed for bankruptcy. Norwegian Cruise Line Ltd acquired the unfinished ship and was towed to Germany for completion as Pride of America for their newly launched NCL America division. In the process, the ship was lengthened from to, increasing the gross tonnage from 72,000 to more than 80,000. Under NCL America, the ship was initially slated for completion in 2004, but the delivery date was pushed back to 2005 after a major storm hit the Lloyd Werft shipyard and caused considerable damage to the vessel which also sank at her berth. A special exemption on the part of the U.S. government allowed the modified, mostly German-built ship to attain U.S. registry. Since Pride of America is registered in the U.S., she is subject to American labor laws and is staffed by a mostly American crew. This is in contrast to most other cruise ships, which are registered in flag of convenience countries and have mainly foreign crews. In addition, Pride of America has no casino onboard, because she never leaves U.S. waters.
Major refurbishments
2013
Pride of America entered a fourteen day dry dock on 23 March 2013 in Honolulu, Hawaii; 32 passenger cabins were added and some public facilities were refurbished.
2016
Pride of America entered a twenty four day dry dock period in February 2016, at the BAE Systems San Francisco Ship Repair facility. Normally, the ship uses facilities in Pearl Harbor, but these were already fully booked.
Vessel class
Pride of America is a one-off ship design. She was originally designed for United States Lines under the class name Project America. Project America was originally to have two ships in the class, though only one was ever built.
The Hawaii Department of Transportation reported on 8 April 2020 that six crew members of Pride of America had tested positive for COVID-19. Two of the crew members were taken to a hospital for treatment, while the other patients were isolated on board the ship. Another positive case was later announced, bringing the total number of cases to seven. Following the suspension of cruise operations to mitigate the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic, Pride of America has not carried passengers since 14 March 2020, and docked at Honolulu Harbor, her home base, with a complement of roughly 500 crew members. She is scheduled to travel to the mainland to enter dry dock with about 200 crew members, the other 300 crew heading directly back to their home states.
