by Donald Wood
Last updated: 12:53 PM ET, Thu July 30, 2020
The Carnival Corporation & plc announced plans to remove two additional ships from its fleet.
Carnival officials revealed in an exchange with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) the decision to add two more ships to a list of vessels already being removed was intended to align the fleet with the expected phased restart of operations and generate cost savings.
While the cruise company has not announced which ships will be removed from service or where they will go, the decision is part of a larger plan to downsize its fleet due to the ongoing coronavirus outbreak.
On July 10, Carnival announced plans to remove nine ships from its fleet over the following 90 days, which followed a decision from earlier this year to sell four additional vessels. The cruise company is also deferring five of the nine construction projects scheduled over the next two years.
In total, Carnival will be reducing capacity by around nine percent with the fleet changes.
Last week, Carnival CEO Arnold Donald recently said the hope from within the industry is that voyages would once again begin sailing soon.
"We are doing what we need to do to start cruising," Donald said during the All Markets Summit Extra event. "Our priority is public health... there is so much yet to learn about COVID-19."
Earlier this month, shares in Carnival rose after the company said advance bookings for 2021 "remain within historical ranges at prices that are down in the low- to mid-single-digits range."
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