Carnival Corporation is consolidating its fleet further, with an AIDA Cruises newbuild and an existing Costa Cruises ship due to be transferred to Carnival Cruise Line.
Carnival Cruise Line will get two additional new ships by 2023, with an unnamed Excel-class cruise ship previously meant for AIDA now due to be delivered to Carnival instead, while Costa Magica will be transferred to Carnival after her 2022 refit.
Carnival now has two additional Excel-class cruise ships due for delivery by 2023
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The announcement means that Carnival Cruise Line’s fleet will now grow by three ships by 2023, with the AIDA and Costa ships joining Carnival Celebration, the sister ship of Mardi Gras.
Carnival Celebration is currently under construction at the Meyer Turku shipyard in Finland. The 180,000-gross ton cruise ship, the second LNG-fueled cruise ship in the Carnival Cruise Line fleet, will carry 5,200 passengers and is due to be delivered in 2022.
The unnamed AIDA cruise ship being transferred to Carnival Cruise Line is a sister ship to both Mardi Gras and Carnival Celebration.
However, it’s as yet unknown whether she will be designed with the same amenities and features, such as the six distinct ‘zones’, the Ultimate Playground with the BOLT rollercoaster, extensive water park and so on.
Mardi Gras is currently due to begin sailing from Port Canaveral on July 31st, 2021 (she was delivered during the pandemic and so has not been able to enter service yet), while her sister ship Carnival Celebration is due to homeport in Miami in late 2022.
Costa Magica will be transferred to the Carnival Cruise Line fleet
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“We are excited about these additions to our fleet which reflect the strong position that Carnival has established in the U.S., the pent-up demand we continue to see for cruise vacations, and the overall plans by Carnival Corporation to optimize capacity and growth in key markets,” said Christine Duffy, President, Carnival Cruise Line.
“While our immediate focus is on our restart of guest operations this summer, this is another cause for excitement at Carnival, and we will be announcing more detailed plans about homeports, itineraries and ship names very soon,” she added.
The latest consolidation of the Carnival Corporation fleet comes after the cruise company announced that it would be letting go of ships across its nine cruise brands, as well as delaying the delivery of several cruise ships that were meant to enter service this year.
Carnival Corporation remains the largest cruise company in the world, followed by Royal Caribbean Cruises and Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings. The entire Carnival group will account for 42 of the 91 cruise ships due to re-enter service between now and November.
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