A Princess Cruise vessel that had left San Francisco on a 15-day voyage to the Panama Canal and back has been gripped by COVID-19. According to the shipping company, 100% of passengers and crew were vaccinated. The Port of San Francisco also requires that at least 95% of both passengers and crew members onboard are vaccinated.
Princess Cruises announced on Tuesday that it is cancelling sailings in early 2021 “due to limitations with border and port access.” The company also cited the “uncertainty of airline travel” as a reason for the cancellations, which will impact 29 sailings on two ships.
Princess Cruises has announced its largest Australia and New Zealand cruise season ever offered sailing towards some of the world’s most dramatic destinations during the cruise line’s October 2020 to May 2021 season. New for this season, Regal Princess joins sister ship Majestic Princess in Australia, marking the cruise line’s youngest fleet to sail in this region.
Princess Cruises and Fincantieri announced on Thursday the signing of the final contracts for the construction of two next-generation 175,000-ton cruise ships, which will be the largest ships ever built so far in Italy, with deliveries scheduled in Monfalcone in late 2023 and in March 2025. This announcement follows the initial signing of a memorandum of agreement between the two parties in July 2018.
In an industry-first, events took place at Fincantieri shipyard in Monfalcone, Italy, to mark the construction progress for each of the 3,660-guest Sky Princess, Enchanted Princess and a sixth Royal-class ship yet to be named. For Sky Princess, which will launch in October this year, a Madrina ceremony was held.
A major cruise line with ships that call on the Caribbean will have to pay a US$40 million penalty, the largest-ever for crimes involving deliberate vessel pollution. The sentence has been imposed on Princess Cruise Lines Ltd by US District Judge Patricia Seitz in Miami, for illegally dumping oil-contaminated waste overboard and falsifying official logs to conceal the discharges.
The U.S. Justice Department and Carnival Corp. have reached a comprehensive, landmark settlement agreement under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) to advance equal access for individuals with disabilities who travel on cruise ships, the Justice Department announced Wednesday.
Princess Cruises, a subsidiary of Carnival Corporation & plc, announced that it has reached an agreement with the Italian shipbuilder Fincantieri to build a new ship, which will enter service in 2017.
Cruise ship operator Carnival has reported profits that beat analysts' expectations, sending shares higher. Carnival had said in March that the sinking of its Costa Concordia cruises ship in January could wipe out profits this year as people shunned cruises.
The Antarctica season beginning in November is likely to be the last one as it has been known. Proposed changes to the type of fuel ships are allowed to burn and carry in this fragile ecosystem have now become a reality, making the future of big cruise ships in Antarctica uncertain.