The return to total normality for cruises, after the long pause imposed by the Covid pandemic and broken only by sporadic journeys by passenger ships, interrupted several times, it is foreseeable for 2023. This was stated by the general manager of Costa Cruises, Mario Zanetti, on the sidelines of the presentation, in the port of Savona, of Costa Firenze, the new unit of the Italian company of the Carnival group, 323.6 meters long and capable of hosting 5,246 passengers.
“2022 – said Zanetti – will still be a year of transition: we will have a winter that will act as a bridge to a summer of 2022 in which we believe we can return to normalcy or in any case very close, and then arrive at 2023 which will see us for 12 months, the whole year, to return to the pre Covid period ».
Second restart
For this summer, Zanetti continued, “we are seeing a lot of interest. This is a second restart, a progressive, gradual and sustainable restart. It is the fourth ship that we launch in three months and we see that, week after week, interest increases, for this summer but also for the autumn and also for next summer ».
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The hypothesis of cruises only for vaccinated and changes to the rigorous safety protocol applied by the company, according to Zanetti, is not on the agenda for now. “Vaccination – he stressed – is clearly the answer to this pandemic and I believe that in the coming months we will get vaccination coverage almost the total of the Italian population and beyond. Soon I believe that cruises for vaccinated or unvaccinated will become a non-issue because, I hope, we will get out of this nightmare thanks to vaccines ».
Costa Firenze, added Zanetti, “is the fourth ship to leave after the lockdown and in the autumn Costa Fascinosa and Costa Diadema will arrive. Then we will close 2021 with six operational ships, waiting for the debut, in December, of the new Costa Toscana, the sister ship of Costa Smeralda, the second unit of our LNG-powered fleet, which will be the seventh “.
Ship of the Florentine Renaissance
Designed and built by Fincantieri in the Marghera shipyards, Costa Firenze draws inspiration from the Florentine Renaissance in its maximum splendor. “It is a serious project, said the mayor of Florence, Dario Nardella at the presentation – who does not trivialize the name of a city like Florence, imprinted on a ship, but fills it with contents and values and I believe that this makes the difference”.