Author: MSAteam

Viking Crew commences crew management of Scenic Eclipse

As part of the outstanding crew management services, Viking Crew, part of the Viking Maritime Group has been appointed as the Crew Manager of the discovery yacht Scenic Eclipse, commencing management from 19 August 2020.

Scenic Eclipse launched last year and is part of the wider Scenic Group.   The appointment of Viking Crew as the crew manager further adds to their portfolio of international clients within the cruise and super yacht sectors of the industry.

Scenic Eclipse will make full use of Viking Crew’s services across Placement, Management and Deployment, as Viking Crew becomes responsible for the international Officers and Crew across Deck, Engine and Hotel.  Scenic Eclipse will also utilise the facilities at the Maritime Skills Academy and will place cadets onboard through Chiltern Maritime, which are part of the Viking Maritime Group.

Operations Director of Viking Crew, Paul Rutterford commented ‘the appointment of the crew management contract with Scenic Eclipse is a further acknowledgement of the professionalism, knowledge and industry experience within Viking Crew.’

Director of Marine Operations of Scenic Eclipse Captain James Griffiths commented ‘Our partnership will give Scenic Group access to Viking Maritime Group services and their unique experience with start-ups, expedition vessels and the ultra-luxury market.’

Viking Crew will also be responsible for the crew management of the Emerald Azzurra and Scenic Eclipse II when they come into service in 2021 and 2022 respectively.

Group Managing Director of Viking Maritime Group Matthew Jaenicke added; ‘Partnering with Scenic Eclipse is further testament to Viking Crew sourcing and crew managing some of the best people in the industry for these groundbreaking vessels.’

Viking Maritime Group is looking forward to a long and rewarding partnership with the Scenic Group.

About Scenic Luxury Cruises & Tours

Scenic Luxury Cruises & Tours has grown over its 34-year history to include award-winning, all-inclusive river and ocean cruises and handcrafted land tours that take participants to many of the world’s most fascinating destinations. Since 2008, Scenic has offered river cruises in Europe, SE Asia, Russia and Egypt on its 15 Space-ships. In 2019, Scenic introduced the world’s first luxury Discovery Yacht, the 228-guest Scenic Eclipse. Sister brand Emerald Waterways has eight (soon to be nine with the 2021 launch of Emerald Luna) 6 Star-Ships offering sailings on European rivers and Southeast Asia’s Mekong River. In 2021, the Emerald Azzurra will be the first ship to launch under the new Emerald Yacht Cruises brand – a 100-guest super yacht that will ply the warm waters of the Mediterranean, Adriatic and Red seas.

Viking Maritime Group in Brief

Viking Maritime Group is leading the way as a maritime services company and operates in the United Kingdom, USA, New Zealand and the Philippines.

Founded in 1988, today the company encompasses a diverse group of businesses including; Viking Crew, the leading maritime crew services provider; and the Maritime Skills Academy’s Dover and Portsmouth training centres.

Across the company, there is alignment and synergy in our ethos, in putting people first and helping support and develop the talent and expertise within the global maritime industry.

Date of issue: 25 August 2020

How Viking Maritime has upskilled it’s staff during lockdown

Due to the nature of our usually busy lives and hectic work schedules sometimes important tasks can be overlooked or pushed to the bottom of our “to do lists” unintentionally.

Back in March, along with the rest of the world we found ourselves in unknown territory when it was announced that due to COVID 19 our Viking Maritime businesses would have to adapt to a new way of functioning without any indication of when life would return back to normal.

We decided that as a company we would use this time productively by investing in staff training.

Ken Hickling, our Viking Maritime Group Non-Executive Director has been running remote training sessions for 5 weeks now and they are available to all staff members.

The training sessions range from basic time management to GDPR to Excel masterclasses.

The sessions have been well received by our teams as a way of continuing staff engagement and personal development during these challenging times we find ourselves in.

Due to the positive feedback we have received, we have decided that moving forward, these training sessions will form a part of our induction for all new employees as well as becoming part of all employee’s career paths with the Viking Maritime Group in the future.

Maritime Skills Academy Gains MCA Approval for Webinar STCW Courses

Amongst the current global situation and travel restrictions being in place, MSA has proudly gained Maritime & Coastguard Agency (MCA) approval to run four of its STCW courses by webinar.

The four courses are:
• Updating Advanced Fire Fighting (UAFF)
• Designated Security Duties (DSD)
• Security Awareness (SA)
• Personal Safety & Social Responsibilities (PSSR)

These courses are theory-based and with a robust assessment process and great student interaction they can be taught virtually as if they were in an actual classroom. The lessons are broken down into bite size sessions to accommodate breaks for the delegates and to guarantee optimum learning capacity for everyone.

The MSA is also currently running courses in its Dover centre but with limited numbers of delegates due to social distancing measures. However, a great way to help seafarers requiring their statutory training is to teach by webinar. Being one of the pioneers to teach in this way, the MSA has found that this will ease the pressure for companies to have their seafarers training competence still met.

Clients and Crew have congratulated the MSA leading approach of teaching and believe this will be a great new alternative method of learning that will carry on even after the current situation has subsided. Reduced travel times for crew and lower hotel expenses for companies is a big plus for providing online training.

Mark Jaenicke: We are very proud to be one of the innovators in delivering MCA approved STCW webinar and eLearning courses to the maritime world. We are always looking for new and diverse ways to assist the seafaring community. This method will not only help seafarers in the current situation, but we see it as the future of STCW training.

More courses taught in this style will follow in the next few months at the Maritime Skills Academy as we see a new direction in how seafarers can learn remotely.

To book or find out more:

Maritime Skills Academy in brief:
The Maritime Skills Academy is helping the industry set new standards by delivering a new level of marine, fire safety and simulator training.

Today, with a focus on personal service, we offer over 500 expert courses to over 5,000 delegates annually. As a Maritime & Coastguard Agency , Global Wind Organisation and GUEST accredited course provider and MNTB recognised centre, we are as proud to be meeting the high standards of commercial operators as we are in supporting individuals to maintain or build their professional development.

With training centres in Dover and Portsmouth, we offer STCW Safety, commercial Fire, GWO, Hospitality and now Deck and Engine Simulator training