Royal Caribbean Group's Richard Fain could not help but boast about being aboard the 2,900-berth Celebrity Edge — the first passengership to sail from the US since Covid-19 struck — when speaking to TradeWinds.
The chief executive said he was extremely proud when the 2018-built cruiseship embarked on its voyage from Miami to the island of Cozumel in the Caribbean Sea, but it was something else that resulted in his broadest smile in months.
"First of all, one of the comments I'm hearing from guests as I'm working terribly hard sailing in the Caribbean Sea ... is how normal this is," he said in a online interview from one of the 1,467 glistening cabins.
“There’s just nothing unusual that impacts them. They are walking around freely. The entertainment is just as it was. The food is what it was. It just feels so unbelievably normal.”
What about the buffet?
He said the number one "matter of pressing importance" to most passengers on the week-long trip has been the buffet.
“‘What about the buffet?’ ‘Is there a buffet?’ And the answer is there is still the same buffet there was,” he said, beaming from ear to ear.
"Now the waiter serves you instead and so a little more service, but otherwise everything's the same as it was."
Royal Caribbean ships are sailing at 40% capacity as a Covid-19 precaution, but Fain considers the Celebrity Edge's voyage further testament to the advances that have been made in mitigating the virus that paralysed the cruise sector for 15 months.
“We are now back,” he said. “The big symbolism is the ship that I’m on.”
There’s just nothing unusual that impacts them. They are walking around freely. The entertainment is just as it was. The food is what it was.
Richard Fain
Royal Caribbean has already sailed more than 150,000 passengers on half a dozen ships within European and Caribbean waters, but he said the Celebrity Edge’s departure from its Miami homeport marked a turning point.
"This is the first one to operate out of the US ... So that makes it a big deal," he said.
"It's gotten a lot of attention because of that fact."
All ships sailing by end of 2021?
He said he hopes that Royal Caribbean will have all 52 ships returned to full passenger service by the end of the year. This is despite regulatory hurdles and what it takes to get the massive machines up and running again.
"Restarting a ship that has been out of service for 15 months is almost like starting a ship from new," he said.
He said the whole process takes about three months, from getting full crews up to speed to readying engines and cleaning each bathroom to a sparkle.
"If you ask for a cappuccino after dinner, the crew member needs to know without thinking about it where it is and that takes a little time," he said.
He said Herculean efforts to meet the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)’s safe-cruising guidelines have allowed for a speedy return to US sailings, but the federal agency will be keeping a close watch on the industry.
"I expect we'll have some more simulated voyages," Fain said.
However, he is confident that Royal Caribbean will continue to satisfy CDC rules as part of its steadfast commitment to preventing Covid-19 outbreaks in every way possible.
A year ago, Royal Caribbean teamed up with competitor Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings to form the Healthy Sail Panel.
Testing, testing and more testing
Fain said the entity — led by former US Food and Drug Administration commissioner Scott Gottlieb and former Utah governor Mike Leavitt — had put a huge emphasis on testing crews for the virus well before the vaccines came out.
"When they come out of quarantine, they've been tested I don't know how many times and they have been given the vaccines," Fain said.
"So these are probably the most checked, double-checked and triple-checked people in the world."
In May, Florida governor Ron DeSantis enacted a state law that prohibits businesses from requiring inoculation, but Fain said most passengers want to get vaccinated anyway.
“[Some] 99% of the people on board today are vaccinated now,” Fain said. “The only exceptions are the children.”
He said the return to cruising had not been without challenges, but the path to the good old days of pre-Covid sailing is becoming clearer.
“Basically, the flywheel has started and it will continue to get faster and faster,” Fain said.
