Sarah Bretz, ContributorItalian shipbuilder Fincantieri announced today that Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings has ordered four new mega ships. The vessels, which will be about the size of Royal Caribbean’s Oasis-class ships, will be part of the company’s Norwegian Cruise Line brand. Though an exact figure has not been released, the value of the order exceeds 2 billion U.S. dollars.
Each ship will be approximately 226,000 gross tons — the largest cruise ships ever built for Norwegian Cruise Line. They’ll be constructed at Fincantieri’s Monfalcone shipyard, with the first ship scheduled for a 2030 delivery. The others are slated to follow in 2032, 2034, and 2036.
NCL’s upcoming mega ships will include over 5,100 berths, each able to accommodate over 8,300 people including crew. They will be designed according to the highest standards of comfort and technology, and will also include many features included with sustainability in mind.
Norwegian Cruise Line’s two newest ships, Norwegian Prima and Norwegian Viva, were also constructed by Fincantieri. The company is also building the first vessel in the Prima Plus class, Norwegian Aqua, which is set for delivery this April.
In addition, three other vessels for NCL are already in various stages of design and construction by the shipbuilder.
NCL’s current largest cruise ship is Norwegian Encore, which comes in at just under 170,000 gross tons. This means that the line is making a huge jump from its current largest ship to the ones in this order, with a whopping 56,000 gross ton difference. It will be interesting to see the design for these vessels, which will no doubt be a huge change from any of the current designs in the fleet.
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