Several crew members from India have contacted Crew Center raising concerns about their current status and rejoin dates on Celebrity Cruises. The crew said since the decision by Royal Caribbean to temporarily suspending all crew assignments in April, amid a surge of Covid-19 cases in India, they haven’t received a Letter of Employment or sign-on date by Celebrity Cruises.
Celebrity Cruises has come up with an interesting solution how to meet the CDC threshold of 95% of passengers and 98% of crew to be vaccinated on cruises sailing from U.S. ports, and at the same time comply with Florida law that prohibits companies asking guests to provide proof of vaccination.
MSC Cruises will restart voyages from U.S. ports this summer on two of its ships. The company confirmed plans to return to guest operations from U.S. ports with updated itineraries on MSC Meraviglia and MSC Divina. After receiving CDC approval for simulation cruise, MSC Meraviglia will sail out of PortMiami starting July 17, 2021. MSC Meraviglia will begin 3- and 4-night cruises also from Miami on August 2, 2021.
More positive news is coming from Celebrity Cruises as the company announced today the restart of a second cruise ship from U.S. ports. After receiving approval by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Celebrity Equinox will sail from Fort Lauderdale beginning July 25, 2021. The news comes just days after Celebrity Millennium made history as the first major cruise ship in North America and the first of Celebrity's fleet to return to sailing from Philipsburg, St. Maarten.
The cruise ship Carnival Dream has been forced to make a slight detour during its transatlantic voyage from Miami to Marseille, France. The vessel approached Funchal, Madeira yesterday and anchored near the port to disembark a crew member in need of medical assistance. The crew member was medically evacuated with a boat and transferred by to the Hospital da Luz by an ambulance waiting at the port.
This month three cruise ships are scheduled for regular stops at the port of Venice. The return of the cruise liners after a long 17 months ban saw the first ship MSC Orchestra sailing to the lagoon to pick-up about 650 passengers on Saturday, June 5. MSC Orchestra will make regular stops in Venice each Saturday during her 7-day Mediterranean voyages this summer.
Yesterday a crew member of the cruise ship AidaBlu who needed medical treatment disembarked at the port of Corfu, Greece. Corfu Port Authority was informed by the ship’s Captain, shortly after the vessel departed, requesting to return in order to disembark a 27-year-old crew member who needed hospital treatment. From the port, the crew member was transferred by ambulance to Corfu General Hospital.
P&O Australia cruise ship Pacific Explorer, arrived yesterday at the port of Manila, Philippines to disembark over 300 crew. The skeleton crew after completing their contracts were assembled from various P&O Australia ships anchored off the coast of Malaysia and Singapore.
Norwegian Cruise Line crew members onboard Norwegian Joy and Gem will receive vaccine against Covid-19 in Puerto Rico during the technical stops in June and July.
Norwegian Joy will dock in San Juan on June 19, to vaccinate around 1900 crew members currently on board. Norwegian Gem is scheduled to arrive on July 5, to vaccinate around 1500 crew.
Barcelona will be the first Spanish port to welcome a cruise ship after the lifting of the ban on cruises which entered into force in March 2020 and will end next Monday, June 7. The first cruise line to announce the return in Spain is MSC Cruises, with MSC Grandiosa, which will visit the Catalan capital on June 26 for stopover and passenger boarding as part of its Western Mediterranean itinerary.
