Fred Olsen Cruise Lines has moved its four idle cruiseships into lay-up to reduce costs while it works on a date to resume operations.
The vessels had been anchored in the Firth of Forth, south-eastern Scotland, in March as lockdowns shut down the industry.
Now the company has revealed that at the end of May they were shifted to Babcock’s naval dockyard in Rosyth on the firth to prepare for lay-up.
Solid demand
Fred Olsen group holding company Bonheur said this will reduce costs for the vessels from £2.8m ($3.53m) per month to £2.5m per month in the third quarter.
"The vessels remain in lay-up until it is safe for guests and crew to resume cruising," the company added.
"A decision for resuming cruising will be taken in close cooperation and guidance from the relevant authorities, to ensure that all hygiene and health standards can be met and prepared in the best possible way."
The Bonheur second-quarter result was hit by remaining demobilisation costs related to the ships of £3m.
All river cruises have definitely been cancelled for the rest of 2020, but the company said there had been solid demand for next year.The Oslo-listed company said cruise revenue completely disappeared and there were no passenger days at all in April, May and June.
Wind vessel profit down
The cruise division's Ebitda loss was NOK 172m ($18.5m) to 30 June, from positive Ebitda of NOK 137m in the same period of 2019.
Bonheur's overall operating revenue dropped to NOK 1.26bn from NOK 2bn.
The net loss was NOK 632m, against a deficit of NOK 11m last year.
The shipping and offshore wind division, which includes Fred Olsen Windcarrier, produced Ebitda of NOK 50m, down from NOK 255m last year.
Revenue fell to NOK 798m from NOK 806m.
The three wind turbine transport and installation ships had utilisation of 88%, down from 100% a year ago.
One vessel has moved to Taiwan for a new contract, but did not contribute to second-quarter revenue.
The two others were working in the North Sea, but rates were lower than in the corresponding months last year.
There have so far been no cases of Covid-19 on any of those vessels but there are "challenges related to moving personnel between countries and crew changes", said Bonheur, which is also the majority shareholder in TradeWinds parent NHST Media Group.
