While You Slept

About 1am Saturday (October 23), AIDAcosma, AIDA's second LNG-powered ship, left Meyer Werft at Papenburg for its conveyance down the river Ems to Eemshaven. 

Meyer Werft Floats Out AIDAcosma

Meyer Werft floated out AIDAcosma at their Papenburg (Germany) yard on Saturday (July 10, 2021). Like its sister, AIDAnova, AIDAcosma is completely LNG-powered. The ship will spend the next several weeks at the yard's equipment dock before its conveyance down the Ems River. AIDAcosma is scheduled to enter service in December 2021. 

This video gives you Meyer's unique perspective of the undocking.

 

Meyer Begins Production of AIDAnova 2

Meyer Werft cut the first steel today at their Papenburg yard for the second ship in AIDA's Nova-class

The ship will be a sister to AIDAnova which will be powered by clean-burning Liquified Natural Gas.

The complete story appeared in the August 15 edition of Cruise News Daily.

Photo courtesy of Meyer Werft. All rights reserved. May not be copied or used without express permission. 

The Cruise Souvenir You'll Always Have

If you bring home a coffee mug you could break it or lose it. If you bring home a t-shirt it will wear out. Come home from AIDAnova and you could come home with an original Nori Storm tattoo - and that won't come off, even if you wash it.

Details appeared in the May 13 issue of Cruise News Daily.

A Milestone in Barcelona

The cruise industry took a major step forward today when AIDAnova arrived in Barcelona to begin its summer Mediterranean season and was the first LNG-powered cruise ship to refuel at the important Mediterranean port. AIDAnova is the first cruise ship to be able to operate on clean-burning Liquified Natural Gas both at sea and in port.

AIDAnova refueling today at Barcelona

Photo courtesy of Carnival Corp. All rights reserved. May not be copied or used without express permission. 

AIDAluna Now Has More to Smile About

AIDAluna returned to service today after a two-week stay in Blohm+Voss' floating dry dock at Hamburg.

The 69,000-ton ship had a number of routine maintenance and technical projects completed while in the yard, but a couple of items on the list added new features, including a unique new one that passengers aboard Carnival's German brand will especially enjoy.

The complete story appeared in the April 16 issue of Cruise News Daily. 

Photos courtesy of AIDA Cruises. All rights reserved. May not be copied or used without express permission.

Gassing Up

Before it left on its inaugural cruise of the Canary Islands this weekend, AIDA's new LNG-powered AIDAnova had to gas up (literally). As the first cruise ship that will run on Liquified Natural Gas both at sea and in port, it takes a lot of the gas, and new procedures had to be developed for virtually every step of the operation. That included the bunkering of the fuel (filling up the tanks on the ship).

The complete story appeared in the December 21 edition of Cruise News Daily.

Meyer Werft Delivers AIDAnova

After a delay which canceled its first scheduled sailing, Meyer Werft delivered AIDAnova at Bremerhaven today. At 183,900 gross tons, it's AIDA's largest ship, and the largest Meyer has ever built, but what's more important about it is that it is the world's first LNG-powered (Liquified Natural Gas) ship that can operate on the clean-burning fuel both at sea and in port.

The complete story appeared in the December 12 edition of Cruise News Daily.

Photos courtesy of AIDA and Meyer Werft. All rights reserved. May not be copied or used without express permission.

Uh-oh

Meyer Werft advised today that there will be a further delay in delivering AIDAnova due to continued testing necessary on the LNG propulsion system.

Delivery has already been delayed once resulting in the cancellation of the series of four preview cruises that were to run from November 15 to December 2. This delay is causing the cancellation of the inaugural cruise on December 2 which was to position the ship from Hamburg to Tenerife for the winter season.

The complete story appeared in the November 16 edition of Cruise News Daily. 

There Will Be a Slight Delay

Meyer Werft advised Carnival/AIDA today that AIDAnova will not be delivered as early as expected. In a statement, the company didn't point to anything in particular that had gone wrong, instead indicating that the testing and certification of the new technology is just taking longer than expected.

   Meyer said the longer testing period has delayed the start of the first longer sea trials, and therefore, they are delaying delivery.

Details appeared in the October 25 issue of Cruise News Daily. 

Photo courtesy of Meyer Werft. All rights reserved. May not be copied or used without express permission. 

It's Full of Gas

AIDAnova has been patiently waiting at Eemshaven at the mouth of the Ems river waiting for fuel, and last Thursday it finally came.

The German taker Cardissa arrived with a full load of about 3,500 cubic meters of Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) for the new ship so it could go on sea trials.

Details appeared in the October 24 issue of Cruise News Daily. 

Other Things You'll Want to Know - October 9, 2018

CND subscribers also read about:

• AIDAnova has completed its journey down the Ems River and is ready for sea trials.
• MSC Grandiosa has opened for sale
• AIDA's second world cruise set of for its 117-day journey from Hamburg on Monday

Details appeared in the October 9 issue of Cruise News Daily. 

Lack of Water Delayed AIDAnova

AIDAnova's 7am departure from the Meyer yard in Papenburg was delayed today due to lack of water in the river. The yard waited for the next tide, about twelve hours later, and they were rewarded with deeper water, and the ship slowly backed out of the yard and through the barrier into the river.

We have a photo of the ship leaving the dock below, but by the time it was passing the barrier, it was dark already. It made relatively good time overnight and by 6:30am (still in darkness), it was at Leer.

Details appeared in the October 8 issue of Cruise News Daily. 

AIDAnova leaving Meyer Werft Monday.

Photo courtesy of Meyer Werft. All rights reserved. May not be copied or used without express permission. 

AIDAnova Ready to Go

Meyer Werft plans to send the 183,900-ton AIDAnova off down Ems River early Monday morning.

The plan is for the ship to begin maneuvering to leave at 7am in the Meyer lagoon and pass the barrier into the river at 8am.

The complete story appeared in the October 5 edition of Cruise News Daily.

Other Things You'll Want to Know - October 1, 2018

CND subscribers also read about:

• A new show aboard AIDAluna
• Grand Celebration has again been chartered for two months to house relief workers, this time in Massachusetts. The ship will be out of service for all of October and November. 
• A woman was arrested for cutting and stabbing her boyfriend with a steakknife aboard Carnival Fantasy during an argument. 

Details appeared in the October 1 issue of Cruise News Daily. 

A scene from "Augenblick" aboard AIDAluna. Note the performer hanging above the state at the top of the picture.

Photos courtesy of AIDA. All rights reserved. May not be copied or used without express permission.

Other Things You'll Want to Know - September 10, 2018

CND subscribers also read about:

• A German pop singer went overboard from AIDAluna off the coast of Newfoundland. 
• Disney is considering expansion at Miami with two large ships and a new terminal.

Details appeared in the September 10 issue of Cruise News Daily. 

Carnival Talking about AIDA's Innovative Ship

As you read in Friday's edition, AIDAnova was named in the Meyer Werft yard Friday night during a really splashy party, and it will go into service in November. That's something you don't see much anymore. (Remember how ships used to be built on dry land and you would see them slide down the rails into the water? Christening them with the champagne bottle is usually what triggered them sliding down the rails.) Then the interior work would be done, and months later they would be finished and go into service.

AIDA is a rather unusual Carnival brand in that it is marketed only in a relatively small geographic area, but it is one of Carnival's strongest brands because that area (Germany) is Europe's strongest travel market.

So Carnival Corp is promoting the arrival (shortly) of  AIDAnova and getting the word out because it is a rather important and unusual ship. It is the first cruise ship powered by Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) both at sea and in port. LNG is the cleanest burning fossil fuel, so it is going to be operating much cleanly than other ships of the same sizes (180,000 tons).

The complete story appeared in the September 4 issue of Cruise News Daily. 

AIDAnova Named in Papenburg

THE place to be in Germany tonight was at the Meyer Werft yard in Papenburg, because THAT was the site of AIDA Open Air, and it just so happened, THAT's when they named AIDAnova. (Yes, they meant to.) If that wasn't enough, the highlight of the evening was a concert by DJ / producer David Guetta. And a huge laser and fireworks display.

When AIDA throws a party, AIDA throws a party, and that's why 25,000 people showed up.

The complete story appeared in the August 31 edition of Cruise News Daily. 

Training for Nova

AIDA will take delivery of Carnival Corp's first LNG-powered ship AIDAnova, in mid-November. Operating an LNG-powered ship is a bit different not only in the way they perform but also in the fueling (bunkering) process and in the way safety measures are handled.

Rather than have AIDA crews being totally inexperienced in operating an LNG-powered ship on the day it is handed over to them, Carnival Maritime has partnered with Wessels Reederei, to do hands-on officer training aboard Wessels Reederei's LNG-powered container ship WES Amelie.

The complete story appeared in the August 23 edition of Cruise News Daily. 

WES Amelie on which AIDAnova officers will be training.

AIDAnova Comes Out

The 180,000-ton LNG-powered AIDAnova made its debut at Meyer Werft on Tuesday when the yard floated it out of the covered building hall to the equipment pier where it will remain until its river conveyance at the end of September.

The complete story appeared in the August 22 edition of Cruise News Daily.

AIDAnova at float out

Propellers are attached in the dry dock shortly before the float out.

Photos and video are courtesy of Meyer Werft. All rights reserved. May not be copied or used without express permission.