What are the challenges that cruise lines
are going to have to resolve
before they can start cruising again?
I'm Gary Bembridge, this is another
of my cruising tips for travellers.
I want to take a look at the seven things that I think
cruise lines are going to have to do
before they're going to be able to start cruising again.
These are things that I've seen people talk about,
there are some of my own views,
and I thought I would share those with you.
So what are the seven big challenges
cruise lines face and have to have a plan to resolve?
The first big challenge they face is
that it's not the cruise lines decision
around when they can start up again,
because at the moment, certainly at the time
we're recording this, we have a blanket travel ban.
So in the U.S., the CDC, the Centre for Disease Control,
has a stage four, category four,
which means that there's no travel allowed at all.
In the U.K., for example, where I am,
the government has a travel advisory
which talks about no travel indefinitely.
Of course, at some point in time,
there will be a date set for travel.
I do also think that cruising will be fairly low down
on having restrictions lifted because of all the issues
that were created and the publicity it got
before and during the whole beginning
of the shutdown and the lockdown.
So one of the big challenges they face
is they are not able to be in control
of when they want to start cruising
and now, of course, that's true of all sorts of travels,
but I do think we'll see restrictions lifted
perhaps on airlines quicker, train travel,
but borders are closed, ports are closed,
and I don't see that lifting for a long time.
One of the things I guess we've learned
through this whole process is
that the cruising companies actually do not have
as much influence and political sway
as perhaps they thought they did.
And that's largely come out through the fact
that they are not incorporated in countries
like the United States or the U.K.,
you know, big cruising ports or places like Spain
where cruises go out of.
And they actually have relatively little clout
and that really came to the fore,
because, I guess, they really realised
through the whole bail out process
that both politicians and the public thought a lot
about the fact that these companies are incorporated
in tax havens, Panama, Liberia, Bahamas, wherever.
And there was a sense that these are not national companies,
and also those who have seen as strategic cruising
is entirely and totally a recreational activity.
So they're not in control
of when they can start cruising again.
I think that's one of the biggest challenges
that they face, and it's going to be low in priority
for authorities to lift those restrictions.
That's a big, big challenge.
The second challenge that cruise lines face
is cruises have become to be seen
as not good for public health
and relatively unsafe, and unpredictable.
So cruising was always seen as this great safe way
to travel, you know, unpack once, move around.
Of course, what happened during the whole buildup
to the shutdown is that it was seen a risky place to be
from a health perspective, that actually the viruses
could spread quite quickly because of the nature
of the people were contained.
It was also seen as very unreliable because of quarantines.
So people were worried about being able to get home.
They were also then worried about how they would get home
and all of the risks and dangers and stress
of being quarantined far away from home.
So they have two big challenges to face.
First of all, there is hostility from the lawmakers,
politicians, ports.
We even saw ports that have relied historically
or certainly earned a huge amount of money
from cruising and cruise passengers becoming very hostile.
If you take a look at Florida, for example,
where you've got the three biggest cruise ports
in the world, they were very reluctant to take in ships
that had issues on board.
They started to bring in regulations
where they were talking about the Coast Guard
not being available to medivac or evacuate
crew and passengers, that cruise lines
had to organise it much more themselves.
They then brought out a restriction
which said certainly ships that were still out
or had passengers during the lockdown,
the crew or passengers coming off those ships
can't use commercial flights anymore.
It has to be charter flights.
So quite a lot of hostility towards the cruise lines.
So they faced that certainly from the ports and authorities,
and of course, the public, there's a real push
against cruising by a big sway of people.
Certainly what I've seen in the various videos
that I've done around the shutdown and cruising
is I've seen a large amount of people are very hostile
to cruising and want to see it kind of closed down.
I've seen the real diehard cruisers who are keen to go back.
But even when I've asked them,
they are really talking about maybe in 2021.
I've seen almost half the amount of people I asked
about when they thought cruising would start up,
when they'd go back, almost half of those
are saying it's into next year,
so people are cautious about heading back out to sea.
That's a massive big challenge the cruise lines have
to figure out how they're going to overcome that.
So I think the third big challenge they face,
how can they make sure that nobody who is infected
comes on board a ship?
What we learned through the whole process
is that whatever procedures were in place,
and as they tightened up the procedures, they did not work.
So, for example, if you take Celebrity Apex,
this was a ship that hadn't even gone into service,
just had crew on board, which were helping to get the ship
ready for delivery, that had an outbreak on the ship
and that spread through more of the crew onboard.
So even before passengers didn't come aboard,
they had an issue.
And, of course, we know the issues that happened
on cruise ships, the very well publicised issues.
What's also very important is we saw outbreaks happening
even when passengers had been effectively on board
for that 14-day normal quarantine period on ships
which were stuck at sea for a long time
sailing around the world, trying to find a port.
One of the things we know is that temperature checks,
which was what was happening,
so now I went on a cruise quite close to the shutdown.
However, what we've learned is that's not
particularly helpful, because that only shows up
once you have the symptoms.
What we've learned from this virus is that first of all
it takes many days before you actually show any signs
and you may not even show signs,
a lot of people who don't actually have any symptoms.
So actually temperature checks is just not going to work.
The other things that cruise lines historically relied on
is basically self-declaration.
So you filled out a form, particularly in the old days
it used to be about norovirus or other places
that you travelled to,
and it relied on a people being honest.
People were not incentivized to be honest on those forms
in the old screening process,
because if you put, "I've been suffering
"from diarrhoea or vomiting," you were then worried
because you knew you were probably going to be
locked in your cabin and not actually enjoy your cruise.
There was no way that you could get your money back.
So there was no incentive for people to be honest.
So there's going to have to be
a whole new screening process,
whether that ends up being medical certificates
to show that you're immune, or vaccination certificates
when they're eventually available,
or some kind of physical screening at embarkation,
and to make that work, cruise lines will then also
going to have to be much open and lenient
around the embarkation and the cancellation process.
So what you're going to want to do
is if you are starting to feel ill, you know,
right up to the cruise, you need to be able to know
there is an incentive to actually pull out of the cruise
because you're not going to be penalised
and lose 100% or 75% or 90% of your fare.
You need to know that when you get to embarkation,
if there's an issue and you're screened out medically,
that you will get your fare back.
So I think there's going to have to be a whole different way
of working out a screening process and a boarding process
so they can ensure that people getting onto the ship
are not infected, are not going to bring the virus on board.
I think this is going to be absolutely key
before ports are going to accept cruises.
They're going to want to know that the ships coming
into their port are not carrying any passengers or crew
who are likely to have the virus.
The fourth challenge that I think cruise lines
are going to face is how are they going
to make sure that once a cruse embarks,
that a virus is not imported from a port?
If you think about it, when you head out on a cruise,
and you get into a port, you head out into the port,
you're going to be going on tours,
you're going to be interacting with vendors in stores,
in shops, loads of people where you go,
tourist sites, whatever, so of course, there's a real risk
that passengers or crew, quite innocently interacting,
are going to bring it back on board the ship.
Now on an average seven-day cruise,
it is still possible if someone gets it early on,
that you could have symptoms and signs
later on in the cruise,
which then, of course, triggers all sorts of problems.
So the big challenge, I think, for the cruise
is how they're going to be able to make sure
that they can keep the ship free from virus
as they start calling on ports.
And I don't know what this is going to mean,
but they're going to think around how are they going
to do that, whether certainly when cruising starts again,
they're almost going to have to go to no-port cruises
or only go to private islands
where they can control things much more and test much more.
But it's a big, big challenge
to see how they're going to wrestle with that.
Of course, there's a couple things we're seeing,
and I've seen some stuff in fact today
that I was recording this, from some of the cruise lines
like Genting Cruise Lines, for example,
which is Star Cruises, Dream Cruises,
they also have Crystal Cruises,
where they're looking at the whole process
once you will embark,
so scrapping, for example, self-service at buffet,
having only served stuff at the buffet,
rigorous cleaning protocols, lifts being cleaned
every two hours, cabins being wiped down multiple times,
equipment being wiped down multiple times,
so I think it's going to be massive big changes,
and that all has to be put in place
before cruises are going to be able to get approval
to start sailing again.
One of the other things that I think they're going
to have to reassure people on
is the whole air-conditioning systems
and whether that's actually a way that it spreads
because of the airborne nature of the way
that the virus is spread.
And whether the air-conditioning actually exacerbated it,
especially in relation to the Diamond Princess.
One of the things that really stuck out to me
in the Genting discussion document
they had around what they're changing
is they did talk a lot about the air-conditioning,
and how the air-conditioning only brought in air
from outside, it wasn't recycled air,
because I think they realised that both for passengers
and I don't know whether it's true for regulatory,
there's a real concern around the efficiency and safety
of air-conditioning, rightly or wrongly.
So those are things I think that are really going
to be fundamental, the whole onboard process
and how they're going to reassure, make everyone confident
that they're not importing the virus in one port,
taking it to another port,
and I don't know how they're going to solve that,
but I think it's going to be a big, big challenge to solve.
I think the fifth area and challenge they need to face
is how are they going to reassure passengers
and also put in place better procedures
and ways of dealing if there is some kind of breakout?
I think one of the things they're going to have to do
is re-look the whole medical centre, for example.
So medical centres on cruise ships are designed really
to do basic triage and do basic sort of help,
deal and bring medical situations under control
and as soon as they get to the next port,
they basically will get people out into the hospital
if they need more treatment.
So the idea is to kind of stabilise and keep people going.
What we discovered, of course, during this whole process
is ships have to have much better
or very different medical facilities,
those that can deal with actually people
who need much more care, ventilators, or whatever.
They need to be able to quarantine people,
much more than a medical centre.
And also probably need much bigger medical centres.
Even on pretty big ships,
the medical centres aren't that large,
because they don't normally have many patients.
Of course, that changed or did change
during the whole outbreaks that happened
on those few ships where it happened.
I think also the whole way of dealing with an outbreak
and the relationships with ports
so that they don't find they're constantly locked out
of ports as we saw in the outbreak,
and reassuring people that if there is an outbreak onboard,
that people aren't at risk of being stranded at sea
in quarantine, not being able to get off ships,
because I see a lot of cases of people who contact me
of saying one of their big reservations
about going cruising again is that they're worried
that if there is an outbreak there, they're stranded
for weeks on end, can't get back into ports
and all the complicated things that happen.
That also implies, and I think cruise ships are going
to have to have a much more sophisticated and thorough way
of planning ahead in terms of these potential outbreaks.
So, for example, we saw in some cases
in the run up to the whole lockdown,
some governments were sending repatriation flights
to help get passengers back home.
Governments have basically said that will not be the case
moving forward, this was an unusual situation.
So I think the whole way of dealing with an outbreak
both onboard, the facilities, getting into port,
having relationships with ports around hospitals
people can go to or facilities,
so if there is an outbreak, things don't happen
and deteriorate in terms of what happened onboard
and what also happened in terms of not getting into port,
as happened in that whole run up to the big global shutdown.
One of the biggest challenges, I think,
facing cruise lines certainly for the next year is how
to actually operate and fill ships when all the passengers
are basically locked out of cruising?
In the run up to the outbreak, all governments,
certainly the major cruising governments,
strong to recommend that people over 70 didn't go cruising,
but in the lockdown, 70-year-olds are being encouraged
to stay at home, right the way through
for many, many months.
And it's very unlikely that even if and when cruises
are allowed to start operating, that governments are
still going to recommend cruising to the over 70s.
What you have to do now if you're over 70,
it's not happening because of the shutdown at the moment,
what you had to do and it's still applicable,
is if you're over 70, you have to get a medical certificate
saying that you can cruise.
So restrictions on seniors travelling anywhere in the world,
whatever form, is going to have to be lifted.
Then secondly, what documentation
or what are they going to need before they can travel
is going to have to be absolutely simple and clear to do.
That is a massive issue because there are many cruise lines
that rely very heavily on seniors,
and many cruise lines have lots of passengers
in their 70s and 80s.
River cruising, for example, lots of ocean liners
that for much of the year they have a much older profile.
And that is potentially locked out.
Those people are probably going to be very nervous
of travelling or even not encouraged to travel,
or even big restrictions on travelling,
like they won't get travel insurance,
and they'll find lots of pressure on them not to travel.
So how can they cruise when a major, major part
of their audience is not going to cruise
for a long period of time,
probably not until there's vaccines.
Another big challenge the cruise lines are going to face
is passengers being willing to travel
because they can't get travel insurance.
Now what we've found with travel insurance
is there's two critical things.
One is the travel policies
do not cover pandemic-related incidents.
So everything that's been going on,
and any new thing that breaks out,
is not going to be covered by travel insurance.
So that's a massive, massive issue.
The cruise lines have to accept
that if there is some issues,
they're going to have to cover a lot of those costs.
And secondly, there may be more and more challenges
or very, very high premiums
if you are buying travel insurance that involves cruising.
Already when you book travel insurance,
you need to make sure that it does have a cruising cover
because they are potentially some really big costs
if you fall ill, not related to pandemic,
you fall ill or you need to be evacuated from a ship,
or you need to be repatriated, there's quite a lot
of costs involved with that whole process.
So sometimes there's an extra premium.
So people are going to be very nervous to travel
without travel insurance covering non-pandemic stuff
as well as what happens if things break out
and there is a pandemic.
One of the solutions may end up being
that cruise lines are going to have to build
some kind of guarantees and insurance into their fares,
covering whether it's pandemic-related stuff
or non-pandemic-related stuff.
So, for example, in the U.K., Saga Cruises,
they actually build insurance into their fares
because they have traditionally had an old audience
because they target 50-plus,
but they've had many people in their 70s and 80s
that struggle to get travel insurance as it is,
even before all of these issues.
So I think there's a lot of challenges
that cruise lines have to solve
to really get the authorities on board,
governments on board, and ports on board
before people are going to be willing
to let people embark ships and set sail around the world.
Do you have any other thoughts in terms
of what the challenges the cruise lines
are going to face before they start cruising again?
Please feel free to comment and have a discussion
and, of course, try to keep it as friendly and civil
and good as we can keep a discussion.
It's good to hear what people think.
If you want to find out much more about cruising,
I've loads more videos about cruising,
both in the short-term and the long-term,
and, of course, if you're looking at inspiration
for future cruising, once we passed all of this
and the challenges are solved,
I have loads more on my channel,
so why don't you watch another one of those right now?