Costa Cruises took delivery of the 5,200-passenger Costa Firenze ship from the Italian shipyard Fincantieri.
Delivery of the 135,000-gross-ton ship is a "sign of hope" for the cruise industry, Costa Group CEO Michael Thamm said.
"The handover of the new Costa Firenze is a sign of hope and restart for the whole cruise and tourism ecosystems. This ship represents the most tangible evidence of the will of our group to restart. Our hope is that people will soon be able to travel again and that more ships will set sail and contribute to the revitalization of tourism in Italy, Europe and globally," Thamm said. "Looking beyond the pandemic, Costa's goal is to design the future of sustainable and zero-emission cruising and we hope that our long-lasting partnership with Fincantieri can bring our companies to work together on a roadmap that can lead to this ambitious yet essential objective."
The ship's interior design is a celebration of Florence, the cradle of Renaissance art and culture. The common spaces reflect a Florentine street or square. Gastronomic offerings are based on Mediterranean cuisine, with seven restaurants and 13 bars.
The Costa Firenze is part of the development plan that includes seven new ships to be delivered for the Costa Group by 2023, for a total investment of more than €6 billion. Costa Firenze is the fourth of these new ships to be delivered with three more to come.
"Costa Firenze is the third cruise ship we have delivered since September, and we are pleased that the name of this unit recalls one of the most famous cities of art in Italy and in the world," said Giuseppe Bono, CEO of Fincantieri. "The delivery is an important moment because it is the concrete demonstration that the company is getting back to its normal production activity. I would also like to underline that the financial and economic situation of Fincantieri has not changed significantly compared to what we communicated in the previous quarters. The company has proven to be very resilient, avoiding the cancellation of orders and strengthening relations with the customers of the cruise sector."
The Costa Firenze is designed to be friendly to the environment, and it was acknowledged as so by RINA, the international certification organization, with Green Star 3, a voluntary notation covering all the main aspects of a ship's environmental impact. The Green Star requires maximum protection and prevention across areas such as waste, greywater, black water, machinery oil, CO2, ozone, greenhouse gases, particulate matter, sulfur oxides, nitrogen and ballast water, among others.
The ship will first sail in the Mediterranean in 2021, operating two different week-long itineraries in the Western Mediterranean. The first itinerary, available from Feb. 28, 2021, includes Genoa, La Spezia, Naples, Valencia, Barcelona and Marseille. The second itinerary, available from May to October 2021, visits Genoa, Civitavecchia, Naples, Ibiza, Barcelona and Marseille. After October 2021, the ship will move to Asia to join sister ship Costa Venezia.
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