Royal Caribbean’s CocoCay Drives Rate and Short Market

“To describe Perfect Day as a home run wouldn't do it justice. It really resets the bar in the short cruise market,” said Richard Fain, chairman and CEO, Royal Caribbean Cruises, on the company’s second-quarter earnings call.

Fain highlighted Perfect Day CocoCay as part of Royal Caribbean’s strength to adapt to an ever-changing business environment.

“We continue to do well because we continue to adapt our product to the changing desires of our current and future guests and the changing environment which we operate,” Fain added.

Michael Bayley, president and CEO of Royal Caribbean International, said that through 2020, 11 Royal Caribbean ships will call at the private island that now features an expansive water park. 

“If you may recall, we put Mariner, Navigator and Independence through Royal Amplified and we completely changed the product offering in the short cruise market and literally put the biggest best ships in that short market, which is about 20-something per cent of the entire American cruise market,” Bayley said. “So we already started to see demand increasing for those products because they are truly great products.”

Bayley said that since May when the new experience opened, the company has taken around 350,000 guests to CocoCay.

“It's now rated the number one resort globally for Royal Caribbean. It's knocking it out of the park in terms of truly delivering a phenomenal day. The guest satisfaction is extremely high. And so the demand that we're seeing is coming from all segments. It competes very well with Orlando,” Bayley said, adding that 40 per cent of guests in the short cruise market was new-to-cruise.

“We’re seeing both significant increase in volume and of course that's driving rate,” Bayley noted.

Holyhead: 30 Percent Traffic Increase Set For 2020

“2019 will be on par with 2018 for passenger numbers and calls,” said a spokesperson for Cruise Wales, discussing the cruise traffic in Holyhead.

Next year is better, showing a 30 per cent increase in passenger numbers thanks to larger vessels, the spokesperson said.

“Cruise Wales works closely with local authorities, port services, and tourism businesses to meet expectations to ensure passengers are immersed in our wonderful culture and heritage so they will return again and again,” they said. “We are also working on digital language translation and an ambassador program.”

Berth bookings for Holyhead Port are being taken out through 2022.

Through the Tourism Investment Support Scheme, the Welsh government has invested in a pontoon at Fishguard allowing larger cruise vessels to call, and the Port of Holyhead is also to undergo change, with a new multi-use berth development with 340 meters of dock space coming soon.

Fain: Cruise Industry Has Features That Make It Recession Resistant

Royal Caribbean Cruises is well-prepared to adapt to a changing marketplace, according to Chairman and CEO Richard Fain, speaking on the company’s second-quarter earnings call.

“When circumstances change, we are prepared to adapt. While no one is recession-proof, looking forward, I think the industry has features that make it recession-resistant,” he said. “The growing appeal of our product, the relative price attractiveness, the fixed cost component, the portability of our assets, et cetera; all of these things make us better able to do well even in bad times.

“A good example of that would be China, where Spectrum of the Seas started operating just a few weeks ago,” Fain continued. “Conventional wisdom suggests that bringing a new ship into a market whose economy is weakening ain't such a good idea. But Spectrum and our other ships there are doing very well, despite the softer economy.”

CFO Jason Liberty said that the company had plans and scenarios it would consider if the economy slowed down.

Liberty said the multi-brand cruise corporation operates a worldwide business that can source guests globally.

“We also have itineraries that go to a thousand different places,” Liberty said. “So what's available to our guest is much more.

“We also have a much stronger balance sheet and a much stronger liquidity position,” he continued. “And I think we would evaluate our plans in case there was a change in the winds.”

That being said, Liberty said the company was not seeing any of those changes whether it's booking levels, even daily, or onboard performance.

Looking back to the last recession, Liberty said there was regret that the company pulled back on its growth.

“We would all be talking about higher earnings numbers today, better return profile today, if we hadn't slowed down our growth or our investment efforts in expanding our global footprint, investing in different projects that would have put us in an even stronger position than we are today.”

The 19-month-old girl plunged 150 feet from the vessel in San Juan on Sunday

The 19-month-old girl plunged 150 feet from the vessel in San Juan on Sunday

The toddler is believed to have fallen from a window on the 11th deck - shown above the balconies - on Sunday afternoon

A toddler has fallen to her death after slipping out of her grandfather's arms on a cruise ship which was docked in Puerto Rico. 

The 19-month-old girl from Indiana plunged 150 feet from the Royal Caribbean vessel in San Juan on Sunday afternoon. 

Her maternal grandfather, identified as Salvatore Anello, is believed to have slipped and fallen while holding the toddler by a window on the 11th deck of the Freedom of the Seas ship. 

Horrified passengers said they had heard a 'cry of pain' from the girl's mother.

'[We heard] the screams of the families because we were close,' a nearby passenger told Telemundo PR. 

'I looked because of the mother's cry. That tonality, a scream of pain of that nature, does not compare with any other scream.'

The girl had a hard landing on the concrete of the Pan American dock in San Juan and died in hospital shortly afterwards.  

The child and her extended family from Indiana were vacationing together aboard the Freedom of the Seas cruise ship, operated by the Royal Caribbean cruise line.

 Both her sets of grandparents, her parents and her younger brother were on board the ship at the time. 

The child's father has been identified by WSBT as South Bend police officer Alan Wiegand. 

The South Bend Police Department in Indiana said in a statement: 'The South Bend Police Department offers its sincerest condolences to Officer Alan Wiegand and his family during this difficult time following the tragic loss of their child while in Puerto Rico. The department asks the community to pray for the entire Wiegand family as they grieve and to respect their privacy.'  

 

The police chief Scott Ruszkowski disputed the statement issued by Puerto Rico police that the girl was being held out of an 11th-floor window.   

Police Sgt Nelson Sotelo told The Associated Press that the family of the child will remain in the US territory until the investigation is complete.

'They’re in shock,' he said. 

Department of Public Security official Elmer Román said the grandfather was playing a game with the child when she slipped from his arms. 

The homicide division was investigating the death, he said. 

'It has not been possible to interview the family,' he said, adding that they were being provided with medical and spiritual support. 

El Vocero reported the grandfather was holding the child when he slipped and fell into the window, and the child then fell from his arms to her death.   

People claiming to be familiar with the layout of the ship in an online forum said the 11th deck is a pool deck on the cruise ship, which would be the only place on the ship that would have open windows.    

The call to authorities came in reporting the child's fatal drop at 4.27pm Atlantic Standard Time, according to Primera Hora.  

A spokesperson for Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. told DailyMail.com: 'We are assisting local authorities in San Juan, PR as they make inquiries after an incident aboard Freedom of the Seas earlier today. 

'We do not have further information to share at this point.'    

Security camera footage from the ship has been requested by Prosecutor Ivette Nieves, who was conducting interviews with the passengers who observed the tragic fall. 

Carnival to use platform ship to fix Vista

Carnival Cruise Line said it will hire a heavy lift vessel used in the oil and gas industry to enable repairs on the Carnival Vista's underperforming azipod units.

https://vimeo.com/345668784The Boka Vanguard, built in 2012 and operated by the Dutch speciality shipping firm Boskalis, is the largest vessel of its type in the world, capable of transporting equipment of up to 117,000 tons.

Carnival will use the ship as a floating dry dock to pick up the Vista on its platform and transport it to Grand Bahama Island, where repairs will occur.

The Boka Vanguard is a bowless ship with a flat 230-by-920 foot watertight deck. The ship's tanks will be filled with seawater to submerge it so that the Carnival Vista can be towed over it. Then the tanks will be evacuated, raising the Vista onto the Boka Vanguard's platform.

The Boka Vanguard is expected to arrive in Bahamian waters on July 5 to prepare for Carnival Vista's arrival on July 12. The loading, transport and repairs are expected to take approximately two weeks, allowing Carnival Vista to return to Galveston in time for its July 27 voyage, Carnival said.

The Carnival Vista's azipod propulsion motors will have all of the bearings replaced while it is out of service. Carnival turned to the novel solution because the drydock it would normally use at the Grand Bahama Shipyard was damaged in April by crane collapse. The cranes were attempting a repair on the Oasis of the Seas, which also needed work on its azipods.

In 2013, Costa Cruises obtained a $30 million option on the Boka Vanguard for possible use in refloating the sunken Costa Concordia in Italy, but the option expired when Costa decided on a different method of raising it.

Engine problems on the Norwegian Pearl.

Thousands of passengers are stuck in Barcelona on a stricken cruise ship while another of its voyages has been cancelled with just days' notice

Norwegian Pearl

A mechanical issue has left thousands of cruise passengers stuck in Barcelona, while another of its voyages has been cancelled entirely with just days' notice.

Norwegian Pearl was sailing a 13-day voyage from northern Europe to the Mediterranean when it experienced a technical issue - causing it to travel at a slower speed. 

The problem meant the ship, which has 2,300 guests on board, missed a stop in Palma, Majorca, as well as Monte Carlo and is currently stranded in the Spanish city.

Additionally, an upcoming cruise of the Greek Isles and Italy, which was due to depart on Friday (July 5), has been cancelled much to the fury of its passengers. 

She said: 'We were supposed to depart to Livorno at 6am and only miss the second port of call.

'They changed it around 9am to tell us we may not be able to go to Civitavecchia (Rome), will not be travelling to Livorno, will be receiving a 50 per cent refund and credit for a future cruise. If guests wanted to fully disembark they were allowed to and to make other travel arrangements.

'Then they announced we will not be sailing to Civitavecchia, our last port of call where most guests have flights booked. We are now kindly asked to disembark the ship by Friday at noon.'

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A picture was taken by Cheyenne Lewis, a passenger on the cruise, showing people lining up at guest services to try and re-arrange their travel plans

She continued: 'A good portion of the guests aren’t from Europe and will be spending a lot in fees to get to another destination. They are reimbursing $300 for airfare costs and have given customers an hour of free WiFi.

'However, flight tickets will soon run out or be price gouged.

'I was fortunate enough to have a WiFi package so when the first announcement about disembarking came on, I just bought my family and I flights to Rome and a hotel room.

'However, from what I’ve heard walking around, some of the flights are not remotely close to the $300 guests will be reimbursed.' 

Another passenger Kelly Flint expressed her frustration on Twitter posting: 'Stuck on Norwegian Pearl in Barcelona. Already missed two shore stops. No info from NCL. 

'Learned on the internet that next cruise has been cancelled. Don’t know how to get to Rome for flights home. Come on NCL.'

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Several passengers took to Twitter to vent their frustration at being stuck in Barcelona 

Jessica Monroe also took to social media to vent her anger.

'Still stuck on the Norwegian Pearl in Barcelona. They said we’d leave at 6am, pretty sure the engine still won’t start. Can they update us so I can book a flight out of Barcelona?'

While Simon also tweeted: 'I was on the Norwegian Epic last February when we missed all ports of call due to engine problems. Used credits to book Norwegian Pearl - now cancelled due to engine problems. Want to vacation with you again but you're not making it easy.'  

A spokesperson for Norwegian Cruise Line said: 'On July 1, 2019, Norwegian Pearl, which is currently sailing a 13-day repositioning cruise from Northern Europe to the Mediterranean, experienced a mechanical issue which necessitates that she travel at a reduced speed. 

'As such, she did not call to Palma, Majorca, and instead sailed directly to Barcelona where further assessments were made.  

'Due to necessary repairs, Norwegian Pearl’s upcoming Greek Isles and Italy sailing departing on July 5, 2019, will be cancelled.

'We recognise the disappointment and inconvenience our guests have experienced as a result of this unforeseen situation and we offer our sincere apologies. 

'Our team is working diligently to assist all of our guests, and we thank them for their continued support and loyalty.' 

Royal Caribbean Orders Third Icon-Class Ship

PHOTO: Royal Caribbean International's Oasis-class ships. (photo courtesy of Royal Caribbean International)

Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. has entered into an agreement with shipbuilder Meyer Turku to order a third Icon-class ship.

The new vessel is scheduled for delivery in 2025, the company announced Tuesday.

Featuring environmentally-friendly innovations and powered by liquefied natural gas (LNG), the ship will join a pair of sister ships slated to be delivered in 2022 and 2024, respectively.

Details surrounding the cruise line's Icon-class ships remain relatively scarce. However, it is known that they will accommodate approximately 5,000 passengers and introduce fuel cell technology as part of an effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

"We are thrilled to announce the newest addition to our Icon-class fleet that affirms our commitment to clean-power technologies at sea," said Richard Fain, Chairman and CEO, Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd, in a statement. "We've designed a class of ships powered by liquefied natural gas that leverages the latest, environmentally-friendly applications. We believe that innovative shipbuilding can reduce our carbon footprint and boost energy efficiencies to help to build a cleaner future."

In his own statement, Royal Caribbean International President and CEO, Michael Bayley, called these "exciting times" for the cruise line.

"Building on our vision with the addition of a third order is a testament to our confidence in the innovative design and energy-efficient technology and engineering that will, without a doubt, make Icon class a game changer," he added.

Royal Caribbean said the order is contingent upon financing.