As U.S. based cruise companies like Carnival, Norwegian and Royal Caribbean cruise lines announce their intentions of resuming operations this summer, countries where many crew members reside are facing unprecedented increases in the number of coronavirus cases.
Over 40% of crew members hired by cruise lines reside in countries such as India and the Philippines.
A fire broke out this afternoon on MSC Lirica cruise ship, according to a Greek reporter, Kerkyra Simera. The MSC cruise ship has been moored in the port of the Corfu since January 30th.
The Greek website reports that as many as 38 firefighters with 13 vehicles and a firefighting boat with 8 firefighters
A cruise guest aboard the MSC Grandiosa tested positive for COVID-19 yesterday, according to the Italian newspaper Giornale Di Sicilia (GPS). The case was widely reported in the Italian press whereas the U.S. media has not yet commented on the story.
The MSC cruise ship left Genoa last Sunday on a seven-day cruise. The passenger
As revealed in a blockbuster article by the Miami Herald today, several cruise lines were so concerned with losing three recent referendums pending before voters in Key West, that they “knew they had to do something to sway the public into voting no” so they “secretly funded (a) disinformation campaign.”
The three referendums would drastically
Former guests on the MSC Grandiosa received emails (copy available here) this weekend from the Italian Ministry of Health advising them that a case of COVID-19 was confirmed on the cruise ship which left from Palermo on October 7th.
The email in question had been posted by former cruise guests, who indicated that
A reader of this blog sent me videos, one of which you can see here, of what it’s like on a MSC cruise ship with its much touted COVID-19 protocols.
The screenshot from the video is from the MSC Grandiosa. It says in part:
“. . . two weeks ago in Europe an
Yesterday’s zoom meeting for the tourism and ports committee brought executives for the major cruise lines together with Miami-Dade commissioners. Agenda item number one involved Miami-Dade County Tourism and Ports Committee Chair Rebeca Sosa discussing the “opening plan for the cruise line.”
The problem, of course, is that none of the Miami-based cruise lines in
Italy has given the green light to Costa and AIDA to resume cruising from Italian ports this month. Meanwhile, the number of positive COVID-19 cases on Costa cruise ships in Italy increased to nine this weekend, according to the Italian newspaper Il Messaggero. The Costa Deliziosa (below right) has four crew members with positive
Several MSC crew members state that MSC is attempting to convince them to waive their legal rights to future compensation by signing a repatriation notification document.
MSC recently requested all of its employees on its cruise ships to sign this notification, which states:
“MSC Cruises’ Notification For Crew Members
We care for you,
A passenger went overboard from the MSC Divina late last week, according to a passenger who reported the incident to cruise expert Dr. Ross Klein who operates the popular CruiseJunkie web site.
The passenger stated “Last week we were on the MSC Divina and there a person went overboard. Around 6 in the morning
