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Since arriving at the shipyard in Gothenburg, Sweden two weeks ago, the demolition phase of the National Geographic Explorer project has been going on in earnest. The machinery spaces and crew areas of the ship don’t need much modification, but most of the rest of the existing vessel will be totally transformed. Stage one is the tear-out of all of the existing cabins and public spaces.

“Demolition” may conjure images of brutes with sledgehammers pulverizing walls, floors and ceilings in a cloud of dust, but this phase of the project is actually a very methodical and even precise process. A team of workers from Sweden, Poland, and Estonia has been carefully exposing every pipe, every ventilation duct, every wire to first check that it is functioning, because when we start going back in with the new construction we will be tying in to these same systems. This is the time to find out if there is anything that has been hidden behind walls that isn’t working properly.

Now that most of the areas that we’ll be renovating have been exposed, our design and engineering teams have been able to start verifying the technical drawings of the ship versus the reality. And of course there have been some surprises: ventilation ducting that isn’t where it was supposed to be; stanchions that didn’t exist in the old drawings that in reality run right through the middle of a proposed cabin where we intended to have a queensize bed. All are obstacles that can and will be overcome, but it means refining – and refining again – the general arrangements of the cabins and public areas before the new construction can be started.

While the work of construction continues in Gothenburg, itinerary planning continues with our teams in New York and Seattle. The general concepts for itineraries are now being fine-tuned for the realities of such things as the air service in and out of remote Arctic communities that will be used as embarkation and disembarkation points, the planning of bunkering and provisioning locations, and the logistics of sailing times between proposed landing sites. Since we’ll be charting new waters with National Geographic Explorer, we have fresh and exciting challenges ahead in the planning of her inaugural season of voyages. 

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