Passengers miss out on cruise trips and can’t get home due to the cancelled flights.
The six-day flight ban due to the erupting volcano in Iceland meant that many passengers were unable to make it onto their Gulf cruise trips.
Royal Caribbean said 50 percent of guests booked to sail on Brilliance of the Seas repositioning voyage from Dubai to Barcelona were forced to miss out on the trip.
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Globally six percent of guests trying to join a Celebrity Cruises, Royal Caribbean International or Azamara Club Cruises vessel were affected by the situation.
“This includes both those trying to complete return travel at the end of a cruise, or journeys to embark on a cruise,” said Royal Caribbean.
Guests booked on a fly/cruise package were offered alternative travel to join the ship mid-cruise or full refunds of their cruise fare in the form of a future credit or an alternative fly/cruise.
Costa Cruises also helped stranded passengers. Dario Rustico, director of sales & marketing Costa Cruises said: “Passengers onboard Costa Deliziosa that could not fly back to Europe were granted the possibility to stay onboard.
“We also modified the itinerary to give them the chance of immediate repatriation as soon as the flights become operative.”
Meanwhile brand new cruise ship Celebrity Eclipse abandoned plans for her launch celebration cruise and sailed to Bilbao in Spain instead in order to rescue over 2,000 stranded UK holidaymakers and return them to Southampton in the UK.
home. Instead of a two-night, round-trip launch celebration cruise from Southampton, Celebrity Eclipse sailed to Bilbao, Spain to pick up over 2,000 UK holidaymakers who were on package tours with UK tour operators and return them to Southampton in the UK.
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