Vibration on Disney Fantasy

[Ravenne]

We were on the Fantasy in 2016. During Palo brunch, I remember watching the Wave Phone, silverware, and my mimosa dance and splash around on the table.

 

[GoofyDisneyDaddy]

Just to add, this issue is definitely unique to Fantasy and does seem speed related. I’ve been on aft cabins in both ships. Dream does not have the same issue, even when it travels at high speed. We were just off a double dip that had to backtrack to Nassau after our second Castaway Cay day due to a medical emergency. As soon as we left Castaway Cay we headed full speed for Nassau and were there in a couple hours. No significant vibration at all.

I also think it must be something in one of the electric drive motors. You’d think after all these years they would have fixed it, though.

 

[Sun_soakin]

Just got off the Fantasy in room 6674 (aft). It was horrendous from the moment we left St. Thomas to arriving at Castaway. I am not exaggerating. It was BAAAAAD. Constant, non-stop hard vibrating. Literally everything in the room was vibrating, and in the hallways. Couldn't sleep (even using white noise) the bed vibrated and it was loud rattling from the cabinets, tv and closets. Couldn't enjoy our cabin at all. I even took video of the hallway and our room. You would probably be shocked, I was when I just re-watched it. We were more exhausted getting off the cruise than we were after 5 days before the cruise in WDW.

If this is in-fact due to speed, the Fantasy needs to alter it's plans to go slower rather than making their guests miserable for days at a time.

I assume they weren’t able to move you to another room? That sounds awful. I can’t believe Disney isn’t doing anything about this.

 

[Trera]

I assume they weren’t able to move you to another room? That sounds awful. I can’t believe Disney isn’t doing anything about this.

After reading this post, I am so glad we are in the forward area of the ship for our cruise in 2 weeks.

 

[MomOTwins]

I assume they weren’t able to move you to another room? That sounds awful. I can’t believe Disney isn’t doing anything about this.

Call me cynical, but why would they do anything about it? DCL doesn't seem to have trouble filling those aft cabins. They have too many first time cruisers who don't know better, and people willing to let DCL choose the stateroom for them via GTY or *GT rates for it to really impact them. And repeat cruisers know to avoid aft, so the loyal clientele aren't defecting as a result. I just don't see them having any kind of motivation to deal with this any time soon, especially when they have three new ships on the way where, presumably, this won't be an issue, and maybe then they'll re-allocate the Fantasy to a set of itineraries with slower speeds.

 

[emilymad]

I don't think DCL cares. When we had the issue I put it on my survey as I am sure others have done and nothing has changed. When we had the issue we were by the aft elevators so there were probably people who had it worse.

We either get a far forward cabin or we don't sail.

 

[turbojsf]

We just finished Fantasy cruise on 20 July and had cabin 10636. We have been on all 4 Disney Ships. We definitely noticed the vibration especially when the ship was moving at 20 knots or faster. We are a family of 4 with a 17 and 20 year old. Everyone noticed it but it did not affect our dining or sleeping. Maybe we have just become accustomed to it or maybe we are just not as sensitive to it as others appear to be. I did re arrange the hangars in the closet, adjust the TV away from the wall a little and moving the bunk bed ladder to get rid of any rattling noises in the cabin. Sorry for those who this impacted their experience but for us it was not big deal.

 

[Fire14]

Great I love Aft cabins and booked aft cabin not knowing this was issue on fantasy. guess I'll find out how bad it is in November.

 

[mommy2allyandaveri]

Call me cynical, but why would they do anything about it? DCL doesn't seem to have trouble filling those aft cabins. They have too many first time cruisers who don't know better, and people willing to let DCL choose the stateroom for them via GTY or *GT rates for it to really impact them. And repeat cruisers know to avoid aft, so the loyal clientele aren't defecting as a result. I just don't see them having any kind of motivation to deal with this any time soon, especially when they have three new ships on the way where, presumably, this won't be an issue, and maybe then they'll re-allocate the Fantasy to a set of itineraries with slower speeds.

So you would be totally fine spending 10k+ on the cruise portion of your vacation, and basically losing 2 days of your vacation? Our room was virtually unusable. I would be happy to text you the video I took and see how you would handle 2 days of it. I had read about the vibration but honestly, I did not at all expect what I experienced.

I agree, I don't think Disney cares, which is strange because they are known for their amazing service and customer experience. It is appalling that they are taking A LOT of peoples money, knowing what people will experience.

They know it's a problem, they should fix it or not place people in those cabins.

 

[MomOTwins]

So you would be totally fine spending 10k+ on the cruise portion of your vacation, and basically losing 2 days of your vacation? Our room was virtually unusable. I would be happy to text you the video I took and see how you would handle 2 days of it. I had read about the vibration but honestly, I did not at all expect what I experienced.

I agree, I don't think Disney cares, which is strange because they are known for their amazing service and customer experience. It is appalling that they are taking A LOT of peoples money, knowing what people will experience.

They know it's a problem, they should fix it or not place people in those cabins.

Would I be fine with it? Nope. I dislike strong vibrations, but when experienced what others have described here as normal thruster vibrations on the Dream last year, my husband slept right through them and I couldn't sleep a wink (and from the above posts here, there were plenty of people who felt the even stronger aft vibrations on the Fantasy and just didn't care). I'm sailing for the first time on the Fantasy in November and I booked midship specifically to avoid the vibration issues, which I found out by googling something to the effect of what are the best and worst room locations on Disney fantasy and seeing references to the vibration in numerous blogs and message board posts. I didn't research my room on my first cruise and learned my mistake. I also by researching found out that there were plenty of other rooms that were highly undesirable, such as deck 10 rooms below the pool deck where there were numerous reports of people getting woken up by loud noises pre-dawn from scraping deck chairs as they were set up for the day. And there are rooms that are next to mechanical elements of the ship with loud noises.

It is not reasonable to say that Disney should not utilize rooms on the ship that have known issues, because that would rule out a huge chuck of the inventory. Every ship has good rooms and bad rooms and gives the customer the opportunity to choose their room precisely because some people are bothered by vibrations, or noise, or any number of factors (seasickness in forward rooms, proximity to elevators, rooms that have baths versus shower only), and other people have different likes and dislikes.

 

[mommy2allyandaveri]

Then like I said, they should FIX the problem. The normal reviews of thruster vibrations would have been 100% fine and it is what the majority of people staying in the aft cabins have reported. This was not fine and not normal and it only seems to be specific to the Fantasy. 2 days straight of everything in the rooms, including the bed shaking is simply unacceptable.

 

[Kennywood]

We were in stateroom 10158 in June of 2015 and we didn't notice any vibrations whatsoever. We barely felt the ship rocking at all.

 

[KashasMom]

We just finished Fantasy cruise on 20 July and had cabin 10636. We have been on all 4 Disney Ships. We definitely noticed the vibration especially when the ship was moving at 20 knots or faster. We are a family of 4 with a 17 and 20 year old. Everyone noticed it but it did not affect our dining or sleeping. Maybe we have just become accustomed to it or maybe we are just not as sensitive to it as others appear to be. I did re arrange the hangars in the closet, adjust the TV away from the wall a little and moving the bunk bed ladder to get rid of any rattling noises in the cabin. Sorry for those who this impacted their experience but for us it was not big deal.

Were in stateroom 10158 in June of 2015 and we didn't notice any vibrations whatsoever. We barely felt the ship rocking at all.

View attachment 419427

Deck 10 does not go as far back as Deck 5 (ship angles in). Our room was 5 floors below and aft-facing. Our room was horrible (and they knew it). If it wasn't, they wouldn't have offered a discount on another cruise. We're hardly "sensitive" to noise but that noise was what I'd expect in a big city, not on a cruise ship.

 

[Peaseblossom36]

Does the vibration issue affect any other areas of the ship besides aft? We picked midship because I googled where would be good for seasickness, so I’m thankful for that but just wondering if it causes issues elsewhere.

 

[TheLorax]

We are on the fantasy this October ( room 6669 ) after reading some of these posts, I forward some of them to my TA with my conerns. He calls DLC and asks for a supervisor (Roy) and tells him of our conversation and my concerns about the vibration. Roy proceeds to tell my TA that there has been no complaints of a vibration on the fantasy at all. $72 later I'm moved to midship. TA and I are very disappointed with the response from a premium cruise line to a customer with 10+ cruises with them.

 

[ivanp91]

We are on the fantasy this October ( room 6669 ) after reading some of these posts, I forward some of them to my TA with my conerns. He calls DLC and asks for a supervisor (Roy) and tells him of our conversation and my concerns about the vibration. Roy proceeds to tell my TA that there has been no complaints of a vibration on the fantasy at all. $72 later I'm moved to midship. TA and I are very disappointed with the response from a premium cruise line to a customer with 10+ cruises with them.

Outside of the supervisor possibly admitting there is a problem, what else did you want? Surely not some sort of compensation or upgrade for a cruise that you are yet to even take? That's the impression I've getting with the "I'm a customer with 10+ cruises" remark.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

Outside of the supervisor possibly admitting there is a problem, what else did you want? Surely not some sort of compensation or upgrade for a cruise that you are yet to even take? That's the impression I've getting with the "I'm a customer with 10+ cruises" remark.

I read that as "surely DCL could be more forthcoming with a loyal DCL guest". Not a "can I get (something) for booking in spite of the bad reviews" comment.

And I agree, that supervisor is lying. I, for one, know that I complained about the vibrations and all 3 cruises I've done on the Fantasy. Both while on the cruise and afterward with an email

Now, whether any Disney CM will admit to negative comments/complaints to the general public, that's another story. Probably not.

 

[mommy2allyandaveri]

I also read this as: surely DCL could be more forthcoming about this issue.

That is 100% a lie and in fact really makes me angry! I almost think you should have to check a box or sign something when you have one of those rooms knowing about this problem.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

I also read this as: surely DCL could be more forthcoming about this issue.

That is 100% a lie and in fact really makes me angry! I almost think you should have to check a box or sign something when you have one of those rooms knowing about this problem.

Well, that wouldn't really work since guarantee bookings will randomly be put in those rooms. They don't have a choice.

I also think it's quite possible for different rooms to have different experiences on the same cruise. Vibrations aren't necessarily evenly felt across large areas (as evidenced by earthquakes).

I've been in 3 different rooms on the Fantasy; 10612 (about halfway between midship and aft on the starboard side), 9098 (midship port side), and 9600 (midship starboard side).

10612 - we had the worst vibrations of the three rooms. As I've said before it felt like those cheap motel vibrating beds. All over the room.

9098 had only small vibrations, but they were constant, not just when entering port.

9600, while, basically, on the other side of the ship from 9098, the vibrations were felt more strongly there. Not as bad as further bad, however, but definitely still there.

 

[KashasMom]

We are on the fantasy this October ( room 6669 ) after reading some of these posts, I forward some of them to my TA with my conerns. He calls DLC and asks for a supervisor (Roy) and tells him of our conversation and my concerns about the vibration. Roy proceeds to tell my TA that there has been no complaints of a vibration on the fantasy at all. $72 later I'm moved to midship. TA and I are very disappointed with the response from a premium cruise line to a customer with 10+ cruises with them.

Really? You might want to show "Roy" this letter. As I mentioned we were aft-facing - could almost reach out and touch Dumbo... Unfortunately, we never had the opp to use the discount. Just for info...we were on an Eastern Itinerary DVC Member cruise - and I NEVER complain but between the smell and noise, it was really a rough cruise.

9/14/17

Hello Donna,

Thank you for sailing with us and for sharing you letter with our onboard Guests Services team. They have asked that I reach out to you regarding your experience during your sailing.

Your feedback is very important to us and we truly appreciate that you took the time to let the team know your thoughts and comments about your cruise. It is through feedback, like yours, that we learn what we must do to ensure the Disney magic is preserved for everyone.

I was so sorry to learn about the disruption of your rest in your stateroom and I truly apologize for any inconvenience this caused. It’s certainly possible on any ship, including a new one, to at times hear some noises, such as the wind and ocean outside the hull, some creaking or vibrations, especially when the thrusters are in use. The vibrations can be felt all the way up to the top decks while we’re docking. Of course, we recognize that after a busy day aboard our cruise ships, at one of our many ports of call, or at Disney Castaway Cay, our guests look forward to returning to the peacefulness of their accommodations, followed by a good night's sleep. Our Guest Services team stands ready to investigate and correct any issues, and if necessary, relocate guests to alternate staterooms when availability permits. Your concerns not only about the noise but also the odor were taken seriously when they were brought to our attention during the cruise.

As a further gesture of our concern, I would like to extend a 15% discount voucher for a future cruise with us. This offer is valid for most Disney Cruise Line vacations commencing prior to October 1, 2019. While some restrictions apply, such as holiday and charter sailings, the vouchers will be combinable with most discount packages. If you could provide me with the best mailing address for you, I will be glad to mail them out to you.

If you have any additional questions or would like to speak with me, you may reach me by phone or reply to this email with your contact number and best time to call. I am usually available Tuesday through Saturday between 9:00 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. EST at XXX-XXX-XXXX.

Again, thank you for sharing your experiences with us. Please be assured that at Disney Cruise Line, our continuous goal is to exceed our Guests' expectations. For this reason, we welcome your suggestions and observations regarding areas of our operation that may warrant more attention. We hope to have the opportunity to welcome you and your family aboard again soon.

Best Regards,

XXXXXXX

Executive Guest Correspondent

Disney Cruise Line