Tag Archives: Carnival Corp.

Carnival Panorama Marks Carnival Return to the West Coast

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Carnival Cruise Line is returning to the West Coast this Saturday, as the Carnival Panorama resumes service in California.

Based in Long Beach, the 2019-built vessel is departing today on a seven-night cruise to the Mexican Riviera.

The sailing marks the return of the brand to the region after a 17-month operational pause.

One of Carnival’s newest and biggest ships, the Panorama will visit three different destinations in Mexico, including Mazatlán and Puerto Vallarta.

Before returning to Long Beach, the vessel also visits Cabo San Lucas, a city known for its rock formations and beaches.

Sailing from Long Beach every Saturday, the ship is set to repeat the itinerary through December.

Built-in Italy, the 4,000-guest Carnival Panorama is the last in a series of three ships known as the Vista Class. Larger than its predecessors, these ships introduced several new features for the Carnival brand, such as the SkyRide a twin-track suspended bike course.

The Vista-class also debuted the Havana Staterooms, Carnival’s first cabin enclave, complete with its own private pool deck and lounge and lanai balconies.

Other highlights are the Sky Zone, a trampoline park and the Carnival Kitchen program, a hands-on culinary experience led by the line’s chefs. Both attractions were first introduced by the Carnival Panorama.

With the Panorama back in action, Carnival has eight cruise ships in revenue operations, including the new Mardi Gras – which entered service from Port Canaveral, on July 31.

In August a total of three vessels resumed operations for the company. In addition to the Carnival Panorama, the Carnival Magic welcomed guests back on August 7 and the Carnival Sunrise did the same on August 14. The ships are now sailing from Port Canaveral and Miami, respectively.

In September and October, seven more ships are set to resume operations, launching service from additional homeports, such as Baltimore and New Orleans.

Carnival Investing in Connectivity Experience

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“Stable, fast, affordable, and easy to connect to and use,” said John Harshaw, vice president of global infrastructure, describing the connectivity experience aboard the Carnival Cruise Line fleet.

Harshaw said Carnival had been consistently making what he called significant investments to enhance shipboard internet access across its fleet.

“This includes accessing high-capacity links, deploying resilient infrastructure, creating service offerings consistent with our guests’ expectations, and an increased focus in overall guest satisfaction,” he said, in an interview with Cruise Industry News.

“In a typical home or office environment, we see a significant increase and adoption of video conferencing, content streaming, and social media applications, and we expect this demand to continue.”

Social media and video-hungry guests and crew mean bandwidth requirements are always increasing.

“The overall capacity a single ship consumed just a few years ago is now available to a single user,” Harshaw said. “This trend will only continue and the expectation of high throughput bandwidth readily available to a single vessel will be the norm.”

Helping drive more capacity has been upgraded satellites beaming down the internet to the ships.

“There are now many new high throughput satellites available serving the ocean regions where we operate,” Harshaw explained. “Though we utilize GEO- and MEO-based networks to serve our fleet, deployments of new LEO networks and constellations are now being launched, with several industry disruptors providing potentially greater options for connectivity in the years ahead.”

Throwing bandwidth at the problem isn’t the only solution, as that capacity needs to be managed, leading to improving automation and utilizing machine-learning data-driven bandwidth management.

“As we migrate static bandwidth pipes to more intelligent routing traffic pipes, creating better visibility into demand usage, we can meet and exceed the price and performance requirements of our guests,” continued Harshaw.

“We have seen a significant measurable increase in guest and crew satisfaction with our internet experience onboard, largely due to the investments and increased focus we have made in this area.”

Excerpt from Cruise Industry News Quarterly Magazine: Summer 2021

Cruise Shares Rise as CDC Outlines Quicker Path to Sailing’s Return

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Port of Miami.

Cruise shares advanced after the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention outlined a new path to the resumption of voyages.

According to the new guidance in a letter to companies on Wednesday, ships can return to U.S. waters with paying customers if 95% of guests and 98% of the crew are vaccinated, bypassing a previous requirement for starting with trial voyages, according to a summary provided by a person with knowledge of the matter, who asked not to be named discussing private communications. The letter was previously reported by USA Today.

Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. rose as much as 5.7% to $92.45 in New York trading. Carnival Corp., the industry market-share leader, rose as much as 4.8%, and Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings Ltd. advanced as much as 7.1%.

On Thursday, Royal Caribbean alluded to the letter in its quarterly business update, saying the message had addressed some of the company’s “uncertainties and concerns.” Royal Caribbean said it now sees a pathway to sailing from the U.S. again during the Alaska cruise season, which runs from roughly May to September.

The CDC didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

The U.S. cruise industry has been essentially banned from operating via U.S. ports since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic in March 2020. The companies have recently ramped up lobbying efforts to win approval for a return, arguing in part that the industry was unfairly singled out for the strictest treatment even as other tourism businesses have returned in some fashion.

CDC Checklist

Technically, the CDC lifted its hard ban on cruising in October, but it replaced it with a checklist for restarting cruises that no operator has yet managed to complete. The industry had previously criticized the conditional sailing order as overly burdensome and out of touch with the new reality since the arrival of Covid inoculations. Florida, where the major cruise companies are headquartered, even sued the federal government to hasten the return of the industry.

But Royal Caribbean said the recent discussions with the CDC have turned more productive.

“They have dealt with many of these items in a constructive manner that takes into account recent advances in vaccines and medical science,” Royal Caribbean said Thursday in its first-quarter business update.

The company reported revenue totalling $42 million, which was slightly better than expected by analysts tracked by Bloomberg.

It said it has started to spend slightly more cash to cover expenses related to restarting the fleet. Royal Caribbean also noted that cumulative advanced bookings for the first half of 2022 are “within historical ranges and at higher prices” to its 2019 pre-pandemic baseline.