Delta Queen receives congressional exemption to cruise again

摘要

The 92-year-old Delta Queen steamboat is being refurbished to carry passengers next year after its Missouri owners were granted a 10-year exemption from a 1966 safety law. The exemption is in the Frank LoBiondo Coast Guard Authorization Act of 2018, signed by President Trump on Dec. 4. The vessel's last exemption expired in October 2008. The 285-foot vessel is now docked in Houma, La., after spending five years in Chattanooga, Tenn., as a waterside hotel. Congress has given the boat 10 exemptions since the 1966 Safety at Sea Act, which aimed to prevent fires on wooden vessels calling on U.S. ports and carrying 50 or more overnight passengers. The law was intended for oceangoing ships, however, and Delta Queen has been given exemptions partly because it operated inland.