The last three cruise ships with passengers on board are finally due to arrive in port today (20th April).
According to CLIA, talking with the UK’s BBC, the ‘MSC Magnifica’ will arrive back in Marseille having sailed from the French port on a world cruise in January.
Although claiming to have no COVID-19 cases on board, the cruise was aborted in Australia and she then commenced her voyage back to southern Europe via a couple of technical stops.
Elsewhere, Princess Cruises’ ‘Pacific Princess’ is due to berth in Los Angeles today with around 115 passengers still on board.
Also on a world cruise, she managed to disembark most of her passengers in Australia, prior to crossing the Pacific. There are no known COVID-19 cases on board.
Finally, ‘Costa Deliziosa’ is due to arrive in Barcelona today to disembark Spanish passengers and will then continue on to Genoa to disembark the majority of her passenger complement.
She is reportedly due to disembark 168 out of around 1,815 pax on board in Spain before continuing to Italy, where the rest will leave the ship.
Costa claimed that there were no health issues on board.
There are still many cruise ships idling or at anchor in various areas of the world, as well as those that have safely berthed in ports and harbours.
The majority have enough crew on board to keep the ships in a warm layup condition for now, but if this situation lasts for some time, we could see cruise companies opting for cold layup to cut costs.
