Cruise ships are returning to Hawaii after almost 2 years

Despite a record number of COVID-19 infections in Hawaii last week and a serious warning from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention prior to cruise ship travel, the state is set to be the grand with today’s arrival. welcoming his first cruise ship in almost two years, Princess.

The Carnival Corp. ship, which departs Los Angeles with 2,138 passengers and crew, is scheduled to arrive at Pier 2B at 9:15 a.m. and depart at 11:00 p.m., docking in Kauai’s Nawiliwili Harbor on Monday and Hilo Harbor on Tuesday.

The Grand Princess is one of 94 ships being watched by the CDC after reports of coronavirus cases on board.

According to the federal cruise ship authority’s color-coded system, the Grand Princess had a yellow status on Friday, meaning the reported cases of COVID-19 had reached the threshold for a CDC investigation based on surveillance data from the past seven days.

The criteria for yellow status include cases reported in 0.10% or more of the passengers or one or more cases with the crew.

According to the State Department of Transportation, the Grand Princess has a capacity of 3,006 passengers and carries 1,188 passengers, or nearly 40% of the capacity and 950 crew members. Based on the CDC’s criteria for yellow status, it means that at least one passenger may have been infected with COVID-19 or that at least one crew member may have been infected.

The CDC system does not tell what the maximum number of cases is before a cruise ship is upgraded to “red” status, suggesting an “ongoing transmission” of COVID-19 or the possibility that cases are out of medical resources Overtaxing board.

None of the 110 ships currently on the list had red status.

The agency also noted that the ships on the color-coded list “operate in compliance with health and safety protocols that adhere to CDC standards of protecting passengers, crew, port staff and communities by reducing the risks associated with COVID-19.” correspond to public health ”.

Even so, on December 30, the CDC raised its COVID-19 warning level for cruise ships to 4, the highest, and urged the public to avoid ocean and river cruises regardless of vaccination status.

Norwegian Cruise Line suspended travel on eight cruise lines – including the Honolulu-based Pride of America – last week after one of their ships returned prematurely to Miami on Wednesday due to a COVID-19 outbreak among crew members, according to the Miami Herald.

Pride of America was scheduled to resume inter-island voyages on January 22nd, but all of its embarkation dates through February 26th have been canceled.

Royal Caribbean International announced on Friday that it is suspending some of its upcoming cruises due to concerns about the rapidly expanding variant of Omicron.

Hawaii hit a record high of 4,789 new COVID-19 infections on Thursday, according to the Department of Health. Case numbers on Saturday fell but remained elevated nationwide with 4,204 new confirmed and probable infections, DOH reported, bringing the total since the pandemic started to 138,646 cases.

The State Harbors Division announced Tuesday that Governor David Ige has signed the first port agreements with Carnival and NCL to formalize health and safety protocols for their operations in the state.

According to the agreements, the ships’ agents must ensure that the requirements of tests and Safe Travels Hawaii are met, said DOT spokeswoman Shelly Kunishige. Passengers and crew members must test negative for COVID-19 within 72 hours of their first port of call in Hawaii or recover from the virus within 90 days of arriving in the state, according to the state’s COVID-19 portal.

Although a vaccination rate of 95% is required, NCL and Carnival have agreed on a vaccination rate of 99% to 100%.

In the event of suspected positive coronavirus cases on board, the ship must notify the DOT and isolate the persons concerned.

“If they are not vaccinated, they will be tested before disembarking,” said Kunishige.

Before embarking on the ships, passengers must have a negative test within 48 hours of departure. Anyone with symptoms must be taken to a designated area on the ship for examination, regardless of the test results.

After docking in ports of Hawaii, the ship’s passengers will disembark on a staggered schedule to limit the crowd, Kunishige said.

The Grand Princess is the first cruise ship to disembark passengers on the islands since the CDC issued a no-sail order for all cruise lines in March 2020. Your visit will be quickly followed by other cruise lines, starting Tuesday arriving from San Diego on The World, a sailing residence with a capacity of 594 passengers, according to hawaii.portcall.com.

Five more cruise ships from mainland ports are planned for January, three of them in February.

A petition on change.org calls on the heads of state and government of Hawaii to “better protect the people of Hawaii and our already strained and restricted health system from COVID-19 by creating new regulations for safe travel for cruise ships”.

Almost 100 signatures have been collected so far.

The governor’s office, DOH, and Hawaii Tourism Board have not answered calls from the Honolulu Star advertiser on whether there has been any discussion of changing port agreements, given the continued surge in COVID-19 cases and concerns about the recent outbreaks Cruise ships.

The cruise industry is an important segment for Hawaii tourism. In 2019, 68 foreign cruise ships brought 142,836 visitors to the islands, according to HTA data. The total number of cruise visitors – arrivals from cruise ships and by air on board cruise ships – increased by 8.2% year-on-year to 272,389 visitors.