page_title: Norwegian Sky
section_title: Service history
hierarchical_section_title: Norwegian Sky / Service history
context_page_description: Norwegian Sky is a Victoria-class cruise ship owned and operated by Norwegian Cruise Line. She was originally ordered by Costa Cruises as Costa Olympia from the Bremer Vulkan shipyard in Germany, but she was completed in 1999 by the Lloyd Werft shipyard in Bremerhaven, Germany for the Norwegian Cruise Line under the name Norwegian Sky. Between 2004 and 2008, she sailed as Pride of Aloha for NCL America.
context_section_description: Norwegian Sky entered service and made her maiden voyage for Norwegian Cruise Line on August 9, 1999, with a cruise from Dover, United Kingdom to Norway. The ship's crew acted as her godparents at her christening. After a period of financial difficulties, she was the first new ship to enter service with NCL in six years.
  After four years of service, NCL announced she would be moved to its new NCL America division as Pride of Aloha in October 2004. Originally she was planned to be preceded by the purpose-built Pride of America in NCL America service, but a rogue storm damaged Pride of America during construction at Lloyd Werft and Pride of Aloha had to be rushed into service instead. In May 2004, Norwegian Sky entered drydock in San Francisco, re-emerging as Pride of Aloha on July 4, 2004. Pride of Aloha was re-christened by Mrs. Margaret Awamura Inouye, the wife of Hawaiian senator Daniel K. Inouye.
  Being a U.S.-flagged vessel, Pride of Aloha required a crew of U.S. citizens.  This made for a difficult launch as there was no established labor market to tap into. The first few months of sailings were plagued by poor service, crewmembers quitting and walking off the ship while in port, and an enormous number of customer complaints.  NCL initiated a new and aggressive training program to better prepare newly hired employees for life aboard a cruise vessel. Subsequently the training for all employees took place at the Paul Hall Center for Maritime Training and Education, a Maritime School in Piney Point, Maryland. Passenger satisfaction improved substantially since the introduction of the new training program.
  On February 11, 2008, NCL announced that Pride of Aloha would be withdrawn from the Hawaiian market as of May 5, 2008. Initially it was reported that she would be transferred to the fleet of Star Cruises. During April 2008, Lloyd's List reported that NCL was looking to sell her to the Spain-based Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. subsidiary Pullmantur Cruises instead, but Pullmantur Cruises later withdrew their offer. In May 2008 NCL reported that instead of transferring to Star Cruises, the ship would return to Norwegian Cruise Line and be re-flagged to the Bahamas while reverting to her original name Norwegian Sky with the first sailing July 14, 2008.
  In January 2009, Norwegian Sky was sold to Ample Avenue, a subsidiary of Genting Hong Kong, and chartered back to NCL on a bareboat charter. In July 2010, the charter agreement was extended. The new agreement included options for NCL to extend the charter period further and an option for NCL to purchase the ship during the charter period. On June 1, 2012, NCL announced the signing of a memorandum of agreement to exercise its option to purchase Norwegian Sky.  The purchase price was approximately $260 million, with financing being provided by the seller.
  Hurricane Irma caused cruises to be cancelled; afterwards Norwegian Sky evacuated almost 2,000 travelers from St. Thomas and took them to Miami.
  In June 2019, it was announced that, following the travel ban preventing U.S. cruise ships from visiting Cuba, Norwegian Sky would no longer be offering their "open bar" service and would instead transition to the traditional way for charging for onboard drinks.
caption: Pride of Aloha in Kauai, Hawaii.
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