MSC Cruises announced that MSC Grandiosa is switching the Baltic Cruises with the Norwegian Fjords for the 2022 summer season. Instead of looking for alternative ports, MSC Cruises has decided to change the entire route of the MSC Grandiosa. The ship will sail weekly voyages from Kiel to Denmark and then on to Norway, where she will visit Hellesylt, Alesund and Flam.
After two months of voluntary suspension of operations, cruise ships will finally resume sailings in Brazil. Clia Brazil announced on Wednesday the resumption of the cruise season starting on March 5. The rest of the season will feature 19 itineraries and will run through April 18, while the 2022/23 season will officially start in October 2022. Last week, Brazil Ministry of Health released a document allowing cruise ships to resume sailings on March 7.
MSC Cruises has suspended all calls to Saint Petersburg, Russia for this year due to recent developments in the region and related security concerns.
CLIA Brazil (Brazilian Association of Maritime Cruises) has taken the decision to extend the voluntary suspension of operations in the ports of Brazil, now scheduled until March 4, 2022.
As the Covid-19 surge caused over the past several months by the Omicron variant continues to decline and many cruise ships are reporting zero Covid cases in the past few weeks, several cruise lines decided to relax some of the safety measures. This week Royal Caribbean and Norwegian Cruise Line announced rolling back of its onboard mask policy for guests, allowing fully vaccinated passengers to go without masks in most of the public areas.
Cruise Lines International Association - CLIA Brazil, has announced that the crew onboard the five cruise ships anchored off the coast of Santos have received coronavirus booster shot. As part of the cruise lines policy and adoption of mandatory core elements of a strong set of health protocols, all crew members need to receive the 3rd dose of the Covid-19 vaccine.
After the temporary pause, MSC Magnifica is back to cruising. The ship departed yesterday from the port of Hamburg, Germany on a 7-night Northern Europe itinerary with scheduled stops in Southampton, UK; Le Havre, France; Zeebrugge (Bruges) and IJmuiden, Netherlands.
MSC Cruises announced extension of the cruise season in the Arabian Gulf through June 25 with the cruise ship MSC Bellissima. The cruise line will offer additional 7-night cruises with stops in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Sir Bani Yas in the United Arab Emirates and Doha in Qatar.
Brazil cruise season is once again facing an extension of the voluntary cruise pause after CLIA Brazil moved the date of return to cruise activities from February 4, to February 18.
Elon Musk's SpaceX launch of the rocket Falcon 9 was aborted at the last moment from Cape Canaveral after a cruise ship ventured under the planned flight trajectory near the hazard area. SpaceX was set to fire a Falcon 9 rocket into orbit on Sunday at 6:11 p.m, but the US Coast Guard could not clear a cruise ship in time out of the rocket’s downrange hazard area.
