MSC Cruises Marks Double Milestone
- MSC Euribia joins the fleet as 22nd ship
- MSC World America Coin Ceremony
Today, two huge milestones were achieved at the Chantiers de l’Atlantique shipyard in Saint-Nazaire, France.
Home to the vast majority of MSC Cruises’ recent shipbuilds, the French shipyard took part in two important traditional ceremonies today.
MSC Euribia is delivered to MSC Cruises
First, on the agenda for the day, MSC Cruises officially took delivery of their latest ship, MSC Euribia – she has now become the fleet’s flagship and is their 22nd cruise ship.
MSC Cruises are the fastest-growing cruise line in the world and the third-largest in size.
The third Meraviglia-class ship, which follows her older sisters (MSC Grandiosa & MSC Virtuosa), differs in she is LNG-powered and, is the first ship in the entire fleet to have specially commissioned hull art!
The traditional ceremony included a parade of the ship’s senior officers and shipyard engineers before the ship has a bottle of sparkling wine ceremoniously smashed against her hull for good luck.
MSC Euribia will leave the shipyard for the final time on Saturday and start her Maiden Voyage to Copenhagen, Denmark, ready for her naming ceremony next week.
During the initial voyage, the ship will be running on bioLNG – making this voyage the first net zero greenhouse gas emissions voyage in the world – something MSC is looking to replicate a lot more as they set out to meet their target of net-zero cruising by 2050.
You can follow MSC Euribia as she leaves the shipyard with our live tracking!
MSC World America Coin Ceremony
The first stage of building a ship (after the design and finance) is cutting the first steel. The next step is to lay the keel, and during that time, a host of traditional ceremonies usually takes place.
Today, several coins were placed in a custom-built cylinder that will be placed under the keel (the ‘backbone’ of the ship) during the construction of MSC World America.
Later on, during the ship’s build, the coins are usually retrieved during another ceremony and placed in a permanent location aboard the ship.
On some ships, it is under the main mast (or attached to the bottom side of it). For other ships, it can just be a prominent secure place that is on show to the public.
The next ceremony for MSC World America will be the float-out ceremony, where she will touch water for the first time – we will report on that when it happens!
