The steel cutting ceremony for the first of two Costa Cruises Ships to be powered by liquefied natural gas (LNG) was held today 13.9.2017 at Meyer Turku shipyard, Finland. The Ship will sail to the seas in October 2019 with a sister ship following in 2021.

Costa Cruises’ president Neil Palomba has announced today that newbuild NB-1394 will be named Costa Smeralda and adds:

“The two new Costa Cruises ships are a true innovation and set new standards for the entire sector. They will be among the first cruise ships powered by LNG, spurring the development of this green technology.”

Meyer Turku Ceo Jan Meyer is very happy to see the ship slowly starting to get physical shape.

“In the last two years, we have had very intense design collaboration with our customer and the outcome is a really fresh and new design fused with the latest of technology. We are happy to bring our experience with building LNG powered passenger ships to bear. Today is a very special moment in shipbuilding, when all the ideas, creativity, technology and signature design that is going into Costa’s new ships, are finally starting to become reality,” comments CEO Jan Meyer.

New production facilities for new ships

Costa Cruises ships will be partially build by new machinery and building processes of Meyer Turku. With an investments plan of 185 million euros, Meyer Turku is aiming to be the world’s most modern cruise ship yard.

“These new facilities will prepare us for the increasing international competition. 183 900 GT Costa Smeralda is also a step up in ship size – we need the new facilities to answer to the demand of our customers and to increase our competitiveness for the future,” CEO Jan Meyer says.

Reference: meyerturku.fi