An Issue with Celebrity’s Plan?

[evandbob]

In an emailed response on Thursday to questions from TPG, DeSantis press secretary Christina Pushaw suggested vaccine requirements for sailings that Celebrity Cruises announced Wednesday as part of a plan to restart cruising from Florida on June 26 are in violation of Florida law, and the line could face massive fines if it moves forward with the requirements. - per The Points Guy article

 

My prediction:  This will backfire on the Gov.

[harkinmr]

2 minutes ago, paulh84 said:

Odd that his talking heads keep singling out Celebrity when Royal Caribbean is doing the exact same thing. 

Not quite. RCI is doing a test cruise out of Florida and will be going with no vaccine requirement. 

[harkinmr]

3 hours ago, Elkins45 said:

Oof...spoils that plan. Wonder where their web servers are?

It doesn’t matter. Nor does it matter where their corporate HQ is. They are registered with the Secretary of State to do business in Florida.  Does that mean the ban legally applies to them? No. But it does mean they have a sufficient business nexus with the state. 

[paulh84]

6 minutes ago, harkinmr said:

Not quite. RCI is doing a test cruise out of Florida and will be going with no vaccine requirement. 

They are still intending to make all eligible guests vaccinate but they don’t think they can accommodate minors within the 5% allowed so they are doing test cruises for more flexibility there. 

[harkinmr]

Just now, paulh84 said:

They are still intending to make all eligible guests vaccinate but they don’t think they can accommodate minors within the 5% allowed so they are doing test cruises for more flexibility there. 

Don’t think so. Listen to Fain again. There will be no requirement and exemptions made here, there, and everywhere. He wants people to believe that “most” people on board will be vaccinated, but doesn’t want to prove it. 

[cantstopingcruising]

1 hour ago, harkinmr said:

Don’t think so. Listen to Fain again. There will be no requirement and exemptions made here, there, and everywhere. He wants people to believe that “most” people on board will be vaccinated, but doesn’t want to prove it. 

If such is the case, these first cruises will be a disaster waiting to happen.

[jj39]

Just wondering. If DeSantis wins or CEL were to back down and settle for any one of these three:

1)      Simply ask for verbal confirmation of vaccine(honor system) but no document

2)      Go the mixed route but require all passengers to wear masks indoors and comply with the rest of the non-vaccine CSO requirements used in test cruises

3)       Add “Covid” to the existing “I’m not sick” paper that everyone has signed for years before boarding, but not specifically ask for vaccine info.

 

Would you cancel your cruise?

 

I would hope management is looking at this. We are booked and fully vaccinated for later in the fall but likely would not consider a cruise under any of the above circumstances. As an aside I don’t believe the June Edge sailing indicates anything one way or another since the FL law is not in effect till July.

 

 

[Nymich]

6 hours ago, FlyerTalker said:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cruise traffic is nice, but in the big picture, it's a drop in the bucket.

Well said!  

 

Edited May 28, 2021 by Nymich
Sp

[AtlantaCruiser72]

25 minutes ago, jj39 said:

Just wondering. If DeSantis wins or CEL were to back down and settle for any one of these three:

1)      Simply ask for verbal confirmation of vaccine(honor system) but no document

2)      Go the mixed route but require all passengers to wear masks indoors and comply with the rest of the non-vaccine CSO requirements used in test cruises

3)       Add “Covid” to the existing “I’m not sick” paper that everyone has signed for years before boarding, but not specifically ask for vaccine info.

 

Would you cancel your cruise?

 

I would hope management is looking at this. We are booked and fully vaccinated for later in the fall but likely would not consider a cruise under any of the above circumstances. As an aside I don’t believe the June Edge sailing indicates anything one way or another since the FL law is not in effect till July.

 

 

 

Until readily available therapeutics are available to treat Covid, similar to treatments for flu or other common viruses, I will ONLY sail on vessels that require 100% of passengers to be vaccinatted.  If Governor Desantis prevails and the cruise lines are forced to drop vaccine requirements, then I will boycott cruises that depart from Florida and plan cruises from states where their government is more sensible and allows business to follow the science and best practices for the health and safety of their guests.  I have choices.

[Nymich]

2 hours ago, evandbob said:

In an emailed response on Thursday to questions from TPG, DeSantis press secretary Christina Pushaw suggested vaccine requirements for sailings that Celebrity Cruises announced Wednesday as part of a plan to restart cruising from Florida on June 26 are in violation of Florida law, and the line could face massive fines if it moves forward with the requirements. - per The Points Guy article

 

My prediction:  This will backfire on the Gov.

There is still time to strike a deal here. 

[nocl]

35 minutes ago, Nymich said:

There is still time to strike a deal here. 

The problem is that until the Judge rules on the Florida vs CDC case DeSantis has no reason to strike a deal.  After all his position is that the CDC has no authority to restrict cruise lines.  If the judge rules against Florida then he might, except for the problem that Florida passed a law, so the legislature would have to exempt cruise lines, or a court decides that it does not apply to cruise lines.

[Nymich]

2 minutes ago, nocl said:

The problem is that until the Judge rules on the Florida vs CDC case DeSantis has no reason to strike a deal.  After all his position is that the CDC has no authority to restrict cruise lines.  If the judge rules against Florida then he might, except for the problem that Florida passed a law, so the legislature would have to exempt cruise lines, or a court decides that it does not apply to cruise lines.

I thought the judge punted it to mediation?

[nocl]

Just now, Nymich said:

I thought the judge punted it to mediation?

He did.  But there is no guarantee that mediation will succeed.  In a case like this most likely not.  If not then it comes back to the court for a ruling.  The only thing that the mediation requires is for it to continue until either they agree on a solution or the mediator declares the mediation to have failed.

[Nymich]

2 minutes ago, nocl said:

He did.  But there is no guarantee that mediation will succeed.  In a case like this most likely not.  If not then it comes back to the court for a ruling.  The only thing that the mediation requires is for it to continue until either they agree on a solution or the mediator declares the mediation to have failed.

This is where I think they can strike the deal.  If they don't somebody loses.  I personally think the 3 state lawsuit helped alot of the positive news we have gotten over the last two weeks.

[songbird1329]

13 minutes ago, nocl said:

The problem is that until the Judge rules on the Florida vs CDC case DeSantis has no reason to strike a deal.  After all his position is that the CDC has no authority to restrict cruise lines.  If the judge rules against Florida then he might, except for the problem that Florida passed a law, so the legislature would have to exempt cruise lines, or a court decides that it does not apply to cruise lines.

Any clue if the mediation today was successful?

 

His Honor was well aware that the cruise lines, the real parties in interest, were directly negotiating with the CDC when he ordered Florida and the CDC to mediate their dispute.

 

Florida purports to be acting on behalf of the cruise industry, but I think the industry has rendered Florida’s lawsuit moot.

 

ships will be sailing before the court rules on Florida’s motion.

 

The real issue is whether they’ll be sailing from Florida.

[songbird1329]

9 minutes ago, Nymich said:

This is where I think they can strike the deal.  If they don't somebody loses.  I personally think the 3 state lawsuit helped alot of the positive news we have gotten over the last two weeks.

Not quite a three state suit, the court has not ruled on the motions to intervene.  And Texas and Alaska have different issues than Florida now.

[cscurlock]

8 hours ago, nocl said:

Children under 12 will probably not be able to be vaccinated until near the end of the year based upon the state of current trials.

 

While RCL has announced vaccines required for some cruises, they are also going the test cruise route which would mean that for at least some cruises they will not be following the 95/98% vaccination requirements.  If they are going through all of the effort to be able to sail with out meeting that requirement then I would expect for those ships and cruises vaccinations will not be required.

"Regardless of the port location, guests will have to show proof of full vaccination, completed at least 14 days before the cruise departs."  So yeah vaccination status is required for RC.  I have an alternate theory on how they can avoid the penalty by Florida.  Just don't allow Floridians to sail on your ships until this Florida rule is removed or charge Floridian's $5000 per person extra for the cruise.  Problem solved.  I would state something like in order to protect your liberties we cant allow you to book this cruise.

[songbird1329]

10 minutes ago, Nymich said:

This is where I think they can strike the deal.  If they don't somebody loses.  I personally think the 3 state lawsuit helped alot of the positive news we have gotten over the last two weeks.

I disagree, the cruise lines declined to participate in the suit, they negotiated directly with the CDC.

 

and most legal scholars think the states do not even have standing to bring suit.

 

the suit is rapidly becoming moot.

[Nymich]

1 minute ago, songbird1329 said:

I disagree, the cruise lines declined to participate in the suit, they negotiated directly with the CDC.

 

and most legal scholars think the states do not even have standing to bring suit.

 

the suit is rapidly becoming moot.

We can agree to disagree.  I guess the cdc just decided to allow Vax and test cruises after months of not even communicating with the lines.

[nocl]

1 hour ago, Nymich said:

We can agree to disagree.  I guess the cdc just decided to allow Vax and test cruises after months of not even communicating with the lines.

If you look at the timing the CDC has been releasing documents pretty much all along. What you did not have was the cruise lines actually working on port agreements and submitting plans

 

The key that seemed to break things loose is when the CDC released the 95/98% bench mark.  The timing of which fit into the results of some studies getting published on real world effectiveness of the vaccine.  Once they released that then you got the NCL indicating that they were working on port agreements, and had started negotiations with the CDC.

 

Then you started to get announcements from the other cruise lines that they were also working on port agreements and were also submitting plans.

 

The timing of events including those announcements of actual negotiations about real plans seem to be more of a driver of the recent details than the legal cases.  Largely because they are exactly the kind of details that would have been discussed in the negotiations over the plans.

[cscurlock]

7 hours ago, nocl said:

If you look at the timing the CDC has been releasing documents pretty much all along. What you did not have was the cruise lines actually working on port agreements and submitting plans

 

The key that seemed to break things loose is when the CDC released the 95/98% bench mark.  The timing of which fit into the results of some studies getting published on real world effectiveness of the vaccine.  Once they released that then you got the NCL indicating that they were working on port agreements, and had started negotiations with the CDC.

 

Then you started to get announcements from the other cruise lines that they were also working on port agreements and were also submitting plans.

 

The timing of events including those announcements of actual negotiations about real plans seem to be more of a driver of the recent details than the legal cases.  Largely because they are exactly the kind of details that would have been discussed in the negotiations over the plans.

This,  there were 3 studies, 1 out of Israel and i think 2 out of the UK that led to the CDC changes and the numbers they came up with based on those studies.  The actual request for the requirements for vaccinated cruises came from NCL because NCL didn't like the unvaccinated requirement and the CDC looked at these 3 studies to determine the safety requirements since it involved real world data.

[bajathree]

What's being released from Celebrity is in direct contrast to what is being released by DeSantis's office. So either a deal is already in works behind the scenes and DeSantis is just grandstanding or Celebrity doesn't know what they r doing. I would have to believe that when Celebrity is telling everyone that they are sailing starting Jun 26 and that you need to be vaccinated and things will be worked out with the governor.....they are in the know.

Edited May 28, 2021 by bajathree

[Crazy planning mom]

15 hours ago, nyc12345 said:

 

I don't see this information.  When I search for a cruise on X's website from Cape Liberty, I see cruises in May 2022...

https://www.tapinto.net/towns/bayonne/sections/business-and-finance/articles/royal-caribbean-to-set-sail-from-bayonne-in-august

[Crazy planning mom]

15 hours ago, Laurab23 said:

On what cruise line?

 

Laura

https://www.tapinto.net/towns/bayonne/sections/business-and-finance/articles/royal-caribbean-to-set-sail-from-bayonne-in-august

[JamieLogical]

6 minutes ago, bajathree said:

What's being released from Celebrity is in direct contrast to what is being released by DeSantis's office. So either a deal is already in works behind the scenes and DeSantis is just grandstanding or Celebrity doesn't know what they r doing. I would have to believe that when Celebrity is telling everyone that they are sailing starting Jun 26 and that you need to be vaccinated and things will be worked out with the governor.....they are in the know.

 

I definitely think there is just some grandstanding/campaigning going on here. When DeSantis sued the CDC in an effort to get cruising started back up again, it would look pretty bad long-term if it the CDC has cleared cruises and HE is the roadblock to the actual resumption of cruising.