(DailyExpertNews) — Royal Caribbean International announced Friday that it has canceled travel on four ships due to “ongoing Covid-related conditions around the world”.
“As a precautionary measure, Royal Caribbean International is suspending operations” on some ships, the company said in a statement.
The cruise line said it continued with the cancellations despite its health and safety measures, including vaccination and testing requirements for guests and crew.
Royal Caribbean said guests who booked on the canceled sailings would receive compensation options, including a full refund.
The affected ships
• Vision of the seas: The return to cruising is postponed to March 7.
• Serenade of the Seas: The sailings from January 8 to March 5 are cancelled. He returns after dry dock on April 26.
• Jewel of the Seas: The sailings from January 9 to February 12 are cancelled. He will return on February 20.
• Symphony of the Seas: The sailings from January 8 to January 22 are cancelled. He returns on January 29.
“We regret having to cancel our guests’ highly anticipated vacations and appreciate their loyalty and understanding,” the statement said. “Our top priority is always the well-being of our guests, our crew and the communities we visit.”
A tough week for cruising
Norwegian Pearl will return to Miami on January 5, 2022. The cruise ship returned after just one day at sea.
Chandan Khanna/AFP via Getty Images
This latest wave of Covid-19 cases, powered by the highly transmissible Omicron strain of the coronavirus, has cruise lines scrambling again.
This week the following happened:
What the CDC is saying about cruising right now
The agency increased the travel risk level for cruise travel from Level 3 to Level 4, indicating that the risk of Covid-19 is “very high”.
The move “reflects the increase in cruise ship cases since the identification of the Omicron variant,” according to the CDC website.
Cruise Lines International Association, a trade association, expressed disappointment at the CDC’s increased level of risk.
“The CDC’s decision to increase the level of travel for cruises is particularly mind-boggling, as the cases identified on cruise ships consistently represent a very small minority of the total population on board — far fewer than on land — and the majority of those cases are asymptomatic or mild in nature and impose little to no burden on medical resources on board or ashore,” CLIA said in a statement.