Second, we had been informed last night that turnaround would be different than any we'd previously seen, and that the evacuation chutes on one side of the ship would be deployed for training purposes. Speculation abounds; one passenger said that this is a requirement every six years, but some of us wonder if its timing is related to the Costa Concordia disaster. Either way, it was one of those "first time for us" events we didn't want to miss.
We "in transit" passengers (those staying on for another cruise) were assembled earlier than usual, at 8:45am instead of 10am, to pass through immigration. This really compressed disembarkation for all the other passengers. Things didn't run entirely on schedule, but it wasn't too bad.
Once back on the ship, we could see the evacuation chutes and evacuation rafts being reassembled near the dock. This was a huge operation. Before any new passengers were boarded, the lines were released and the Emerald Princess moved away from the dock and into the channel at Port Everglades, where the ship turned 180 degrees and was docked on its the other side (the port side). Now the ship was facing the 17th Street drawbridge, and the loading of food, supplies and new passengers continued...on the other side of the ship. This must have made things very interesting down in the food stores area!
If you look closely at the second photo, you can see the collapsed chutes on top of each evacuation raft. The intent (I think) is that passengers would slide down the chute to the top of the raft, crawl over to the hole in the roof and drop down inside of the raft.
