Disney Cruise Line’s upcoming ship Disney Wish has been delayed due to the ongoing health crisis.
Theirs is one of several vessels that are having their rollouts delayed even as the industry slowly moves toward restarting in U.S. markets.
Disney Wish, which was scheduled for delivery in January 2022, has been pushed back to a date that has yet to be determined.
During a conference call, Disney’s Chief Financial Officer Christine McCarty said, “The shipyard we utilize for our cruise ships, Meyer Werft, was impacted [by the current situation] and we encountered a delay.”
Earlier this summer, Meyer Werft essentially shut down for six weeks. The company also predicted that they would have to downgrade their production schedule from the usual two large ships and one smaller vessel to one in each category.
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Aside from Disney Wish, Meyer Werft is also building Royal Caribbean’s Odyssey of the Seas, AIDA Cruises AIDAcosma, P&O’s Iona, and Saga Cruises’ Spirit of Adventure.
Like Wish, Royal Caribbean announced that Odyssey would be delayed. In that case, delivery is being pushed from Fall 2020 until April 2021.
In recent years the yard has completed Spectrum of the Seas, Norwegian Encore, Norwegian Bliss, AIDAnova, and Spirit of Discovery.
Currently, no cruise ships are sailing from North America. In alignment with the announcement made on August 5, 2020, by Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA) regarding the voluntary extension of suspended passenger operations from U.S. ports, Disney Cruise Line has canceled sailings through at least October 31, 2020.
The first ships to return to service are all scheduled for the first week of November. Disney Fantasy, which sails out of Port Canaveral, is scheduled to be the first ship to return to service. The Disney Wonder is slated to become the next ship in the fleet to welcome guests when it resumes sailings on November 21.
