MSC Divina recently departed her new homeport of Port Canaveral/Orlando, Florida for 3-night sailing. Divina is joining MSC Meraviglia for sailings in the Caribbean Sea and The Bahamas, including the company’s private island, Ocean Cay MSC Reserve.
MSC Divina is the eleventh ship in the MSC Cruises fleet to restart operations after the cruise line resumed international sailings in August 2020. MSC Grandiosa became the first major cruise ship to resume operations as she departed Genoa for a seven-night voyage in the West Mediterranean on August 16, 2020.
This re-start was down to a range of local, regional and national authorities in Europe sanctioning a health and safety protocol that MSC Cruises had developed with an external panel of medical and public health experts designed for the wellbeing of guests, crew and communities that the company’s ships would call. This protocol eventually set the standard for the industry and paved the way for more lines to restart.
MSC Divina set sail for a 3-night cruise from her new homeport of Port Canaveral/Orlando in the USA to Nassau and the company’s private island destination, Ocean Cay MSC Marine Reserve in The Bahamas.
MSC Divina is joining MSC Meraviglia in the US state of Florida where she sails from Miami to The Bahamas, Ocean Cay, Cayman Islands, Jamaica and Mexico. US-based guests now have the choice of 3-, 4- and 7-night itineraries from the two embarkation ports.
Twelve months on and more than half of the line’s fleet is safely back at sea. Six MSC Cruises’ ships are currently sailing in the Mediterranean – MSC Seashore, MSC Grandiosa, MSC Seaside, MSC Orchestra, MSC Splendida and MSC Magnifica. MSC Virtuosa is set to join them on 22 September to offer 9-night cruises from Genoa with calls at Malaga, Cadiz, Lisbon, Barcelona and Marseille. MSC Seaview is currently sailing in the Baltic Sea from Kiel in Germany with cruises to Sweden and Estonia. MSC Bellissima is operating in the Red Sea from Jeddah, Saudi Arabia to Egypt and Jordan.
More ships are scheduled to resume operations in the coming weeks and months as part of the line’s phased plan for returning the full fleet to operations by next year.
MSC Cruises is forging ahead
Remarkably, during the global industry’s shutdown MSC Cruises has forged ahead with its determined ambition for sustainable growth as it simultaneously returned ships to water. But while the past twelve months were a very busy year of return to service, the cruise line retained an undiminished laser-focus on the long-term future of the business and in a sustainable manner.
During the shutdown MSC Cruises was the only major cruise line which did not put up any ships for sale or send ships to be scrapped. Instead the company took delivery of two new ships. MSC Virtuosa was delivered in February from the Chantiers de l’Atlantique shipyard in Saint-Nazaire, France and in July MSC Seashore was handed over from Fincantieri in Monfalcone, Italy. Furthermore the company celebrated the cutting of the first steel for its second LNG-powered ship MSC Euribia to be delivered in 2023. Also in june 2021 the keel was laid for MSC Seascape to be delivered in November 2022. The company also launched its luxury brand Explora Journeys and cut the first steel of the luxury brand’s first ship Explora I which is scheduled for delivery in 2023. MSC Cruises finally signed a five-year preferential berthing rights deal with Cruise Saudi for Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.