Independently owned cruise line, Cruise & Maritime Voyages (CMV) has acquired two more cruise ships to join their expanding ocean fleet — increasing to eight cruise ships in 2021.
CMV will take delivery of P&O Australia’s Pacific Dawn in Singapore in March 2020 and Pacific Aria in May 2020, increasing lower bed fleet capacity to 9,000 berths and passenger capacity by 30 percent in 2021.
The ships will be officially re-named in summer 2021 following dry docking, some minor upgrade and re-livery works in Singapore before embarking on CMV maiden positioning voyages via the Suez Canal to Northern Europe.
Pacific Dawn, at 70,285grt, with 798 passenger cabins and carrying about 1,400 passengers, will be deployed on the U.K. market in late May 2021.
Pacific Aria, at 55,819grt, with 630 passenger cabins and carrying about 1,100 passengers, will be deployed on the German market under the TransOcean Kreuzfahrten brand, cruising alongside Vasco da Gama and replacing the 580 passenger Astor. She is being re-named Jules Verne and will be re-deployed to the French market in May 2021.
For 2020, the company expect close to 70 percent of capacity to be sold by the year end.
Christian Verhounig, CEO commented, “The introduction of two more ships to the global ocean fleet is the next exciting chapter of our strategic growth objectives. This will enable us to service increasing market demand for our traditional brand of cruising generated by our expanding international network of in-house sales offices and developing source markets. We have now acquired five cruise ships in just five years and are firmly on course in carrying 200,000 passengers in 2021.”
Chris Coates, Group Commercial Director, added, “As the CMV brand continues to evolve, the growing popularity of our traditional product, classic ships and destination focused cruise programs has encouraged us to accelerate plans to add capacity to the two top European cruise markets in the U.K. and Germany, which represent 85 percent of our business.»
By the Maritime Executive.
