Carnival Corp. announced 2 newbuild agreements they entered into.
The first deal inked with Carnival Favorite Fincanteri, calls for one ship for Italian/European brand Costa Crociere. The unnamed vessel will come in at 132,500grt. making her the largest for Costa and 3rd largest in Carnival Corp (QM2 and Royal Princess are larger). Pax numbers are, 3,700 lower berths, 4,928 total guests. Delivery of the USD$794 million vessel will be 2014. She will be constructed in the Venice yard. Surprisingly she will be larger then the Carnival Dream class by 2,000 grt. No word on if its going to be a Deam class enlarged or if its an advancement of the Royal Princess class.
The second deal is for two 125,000 grt vessels fro German club line AIDA. These also will be the largest for its brand. The two 3,250 pax vessels will be constructed at surprisingly Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. This will be the 3rd and 4th cruise ship build for a major line from Japan (Diamond and Sapphire Princess being the others). They will debut in March 2015 and March 2016. This solidifies the rumor going around in may that I reported.