Reversing the trend of the past few years when cruise lines seemed to be announcing almost daily plans for new ships and for overhauling and upgrading older ships, almost all such work has now ground to a halt.
The upgrades, some of them costing over $100 million, typically add features such as new restaurants, recreation areas and the like, but some smaller older ships are stretched to greater capacity by adding new ‘middles’ to them.
The hold on this work reflects two causes: one is that the cruise lines need, for now, to hold onto money because of Covid-induced losses, and second, many of the shipyards belonging to the two major groups that build and upgrade them are closed because of lockdowns. The cash could be the biggest issue; Carnival Corp. has said it is burning through about a billion a month.
Whether, or how soon, some of the projects will be restarted remains to be seen, and depends to some extent on how quickly the industry recovers. A few ships that were already in shipyards for work, will likely restart, but for others that’s not certain.
In the meantime, cruise lines that had hoped to resume sailing in May are now extending their shutdowns until mid summer; Viking and all of Carnival’s brands have set June 30 as the earliest date, and Princess and Holland America have actually canceled all of their Alaska itineraries through the end of the year.
