The resurgence of COVID-19 in Europe and the subsequent measures applied have forced major cruise lines to readjust their operations.
Costa Cruises
The Italian cruise company Costa Cruises, part of Carnival Corporation, announced updates to its upcoming cruises for winter 2020-2021.
The LNG-powered Costa Smeralda will extend current cruises only in Italy until the end of February 2021, visiting Savona, La Spezia, Cagliari, Messina, Naples and Civitavecchia/Rome. This one-week itinerary will replace the one in Italy, France and Spain that the ship would have offered starting from Nov. 14, 2020.
The Costa Deliziosa will continue operating its current one-week itinerary in Italy and Greece until Jan. 3, 2021 – calling at Trieste, Katakolon/Olympia, Athens, Heraklion/Crete and Bari, instead of visiting Montenegro and Croatia as originally planned.
Costa Diadema will postpone the start of its long cruises in the Mediterranean to April 6, 2021, offering 14-day cruises to Turkey and 14-day cruises to Egypt and Greece, as scheduled.
The new ship Costa Firenze, which is currently in the final stages of completion at the Fincantieri shipyard in Marghera, will be delivered as planned in mid-December 2020, but it will begin offering its seven-day cruises in Italy, France and Spain only from Feb. 28, 2021.
Finally, the Costa Favolosa cruises in the Caribbean are canceled and the ship will return to operate from April 2, 2021, with mini-cruises in the Mediterranean. The 2021 World Tour of Costa Deliziosa is also canceled.
Princess Cruises
In addition, due to the uncertainty about when international travel restrictions might be lifted, Princess Cruises, also part of Carnival, announced extension of its pause in operations for cruises departing from Australia and New Zealand through May 31, 2021.
TUI Cruises
Meanwhile, responding to Germany’s emergency lockdown, TUI Cruises underlined that it will not cease its cruise operations. The company currently has three ships in service, including two ships which are sailing from German homeports on cruises composed of just sea days, and another ship which is operating in Greece.
Royal Caribbean
Furthermore, the global health crisis has forced Royal Caribbean to cancel most of its cruises through November 30, 2020 and Australian cruises through December 31st, 2020. Its goal is to resume operations on December 1st, 2020.
Odyssey of the Seas sailings from November 5th, 2020 through April 17th, 2021 will be cancelled, as a mixed result of the closure of shipyards along with the disruption to the supply chain caused by this pandemic.
Liberty of the Seas’ amplification has been postponed to a later date, and the ship will now sail to Galveston earlier than planned. Regrettably, only one ship can dock at the Galveston pier at a time, so the February 14, 2021 Jewel of the Seas cruise was canceled. Spectrum of the Seas sailings through November 23, 2020 have also been cancelled.
Quantum of the Seas sailings have also been cancelled, while Quantum of the Seas sailings departing December 2nd, 2020 – March 22nd, 2021 will bee assessed.
In the meantime, the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) updated its warning last week to travelers to defer all cruise travel worldwide. The Level 3 warning was updated on October 21st due to, “widespread ongoing spread of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has been reported in some countries. Other countries have reported sustained community spread.”
