Covid protocols on MSC

[Froggitt]

Was on Virtuosa earlier this month. Came away with the impression that MSC really doesn't care about Covid. Examples:

 

• they have four main dining rooms and yet only one was open for breakfast and lunch, into which they ram people onto tables an inch apart - people then tightly queueing all round the ship and back again to get into the one dining room
• they put random solos onto one large table
• the only place staff asked for a mask to be worn was on entering the dining room. 90% of people in the theatre weren't wearing a mask and not one member of staff asked them to do so. Total contrast from Princess a couple of weeks earlier when everywhere you went, you were reminded to wear a mask if you werent doing do
• Bizzarely they asked people to wear a mask when outside on deck, although again, this was never enforced. All there was was an hourly tannoy "Please wear your masks" which got rather annoying.

 

I'm assuming the cruise director and his badly fitting suit went down with Covid halfway thru the cruise as he was never seen or heard from again.

 

Passengers were getting more information about Covid outbreaks on the boat from googling newspaper reports than from MSC. If you ever heard "Would Mr and Mrs Smith please go to their cabin and call extn 99", you knew they had tested positive for Covid, and would be met there and swiftly removed by men in white hazmat suits to "the Covid deck".

 

[styles27]

Sounds like anything goes over there. Happy to hear the sailings out of FL aren’t like that but they do have CDC guidelines here. 
 

Where was your Princess cruise Europe or Caribbean?
 

[Froggitt]

Europe.....well UK only.

[MarkusToe]

Similar for Seashore.

Buffet packed

Elevator 15 pax instead of 4

Whirlpool 10 instead of 4

In theater mask was enforced.

 

 

[KennyFla]

2 hours ago, Froggitt said:

Europe.....well UK only.

Which sailing were you on?

[Froggitt]

7 minutes ago, KennyFla said:

Which sailing were you on?

4-11 Sept from Southampton

[hamrag]

3 minutes ago, Froggitt said:

4-11 Sept from Southampton

That's why we didn't notice the CD being AWOL, not that we'd really have noticed anyway as he was beyond awful....we sailed from Greenock 1st to 8th Sept.

[showingdiva]

1 hour ago, Froggitt said:

4-11 Sept from Southampton

 

I was on 7-11th.   I sailed as a solo.   Only took one mention that I wasn't ready to be sitting closely to strangers in restaurants - no problem, happy to oblige.   I saw several people in the theatre being asked to put their masks on (originally hanging around their chin).    If there are big queues at the bar / buffet .. walk away.   No-one is going to starve / dehydrate for a little longer wait,

 

MSC are coming under some amount of criticism on multiple social media.   As I said on another thread - could they have done things differently in hindsight?  Yes, they could.   But some passengers also needed to take a look at their own actions.    In the resumption of cruising, the cruise lines needed to have some faith in their customers to do their bit also.

 

But, at the time I sailed - 1/70 in England and 1/45 in Scotland were testing positive for coronavirus.   This virus doesn't disappear on the way up the air bridge to the ship.    

[KennyFla]

12 minutes ago, showingdiva said:

 

I was on 7-11th.   I sailed as a solo.   Only took one mention that I wasn't ready to be sitting closely to strangers in restaurants - no problem, happy to oblige.   I saw several people in the theatre being asked to put their masks on (originally hanging around their chin).    If there are big queues at the bar / buffet .. walk away.   No-one is going to starve / dehydrate for a little longer wait,

 

MSC are coming under some amount of criticism on multiple social media.   As I said on another thread - could they have done things differently in hindsight?  Yes, they could.   But some passengers also needed to take a look at their own actions.    In the resumption of cruising, the cruise lines needed to have some faith in their customers to do their bit also.

 

But, at the time I sailed - 1/70 in England and 1/45 in Scotland were testing positive for coronavirus.   This virus doesn't disappear on the way up the air bridge to the ship.    

It is an interesting phenomenon that is happening.  Some people expect the cruise lines to monitor and control everyone's actions 24 hrs a day.  This can lead to an extreme (look at videos coming out of Australia).  Not everyone is going to follow the rules.  Protect yourself.   Wear your mask, don't go into crowded conditions, ask to be moved to a different table if you don't feel comfortable.  Just because you step onto a cruise ship the real world does not disappear.

 

[styles27]

Are there capacity limits for cruise ships in Europe?