P&O Cruises has joined a long list of cruise lines to recently further cut back on the places people can smoke on board. The cruise line’s six ships will all ban smoking in interior areas of its vessels; including cabins and casinos.
The British line already forbids indoor smoking on three of its ships. This went into effect in line with the UK’s indoor smoking ban. Two more ships, the Aurora and Oriana will ban smoke in April, with The Arcadia banning indoor smoking in May.
P&O will be debuting its seventh vessel in April, called Azura, it will also be smoke [...]

Speculation has been abound about a passenger on an Alaskan cruise that went missing this week. The body of the passenger finally turned up in the Icy waters.
The passenger on board was Amber Malkuch, 45, and after thorough review of evidence and camera footage she is judged to have committed suicide.
“Based on evidence and information to date, it does not appear to be foul play,” Holland America spokeswoman Sally Andrews said from Seattle. “From what we have seen to date, it appears to be a suicide.”
Despite announcements by investigators and spokespersons from the cruise line, the state troopers of Alaska [...]

Themed cruises have already popped up for many niches in recent years. There are cruises for jazz lovers and cruises for nudists. The newest one that will be offered on Norwegian Cruise Line and Royal Caribbean is Cruises for Divorcees.
The cruise retailer Cruise.com announced its billing formula for these cruises this week. The sailings will leave port this coming October. Norwegian Cruise Line and Royal Caribbean will be the two cruise lines trying the project. The shortest cruises will be three nights and there are discount tickets available for only $199. A good deal for cruisers who may be tied [...]

A Washington State woman fell overboard from Holland America’s Zaandam cruise ship during an Alaska cruise. Her body was found on Monday.
The woman disappeared from the ship somewhere between Douglas Island and Glacier Bay National Park. The Coast Guard reported that the body was eventually discovered by a Temsco helicopter. It was located on the west side of Douglas Island.
The name of the woman was recently released. Her name is Amber Malkuch and she was 45 years old. Holland America said that they would notify the family, but could not release the woman’s name. Her name was released independently.
The Zaandam [...]

The committee for transportation and infrastructure in America’s congress unanimously passed a new bill relating to crime reporting on cruise lines. It now waits to be passed by the senate.
The bill will tighten restriction on an industry that not been scrutinized in recent years, because of the complexities of international maritime law.
Originally, many cruise lines opposed the bill, but the International Association representing their interests has changed its stance. According to the association most companies already follow the new provisions, such as sharing crime data with the coast guard and other aspects already addressed by federal laws.
“Millions of passengers each [...]

The vessel operators of Seattle’s port have started a program that will reduce emissions of Sulfar Dioxide by at least 80 percent and diesel particulate by 60 percent. This will help Seattle meet its clean-air targets.
The program was unveiled this month. It is called ABC fuels. It involves low sulfur diesel fuel powering auxiliary engines.
Engineers of the plan believe that it reduces emissions when it makes the greatest difference, when ships are in port. When ships are in port they are close to where people live and work.
One of the challenges for implementing the plan is the price difference for [...]

Princess Cruises and Cunard have both lined the list of business to use GolinHarris Advertising agency to launch their new campaigns. The agency has a well-developed reputation for brand awareness, social media and promotions.
The company was selected because it has experience with “new media”. The Los Angeles company is thought to be on the cutting edge in terms of judging ever changing trends and using new technologies to maximize their campaigns.
A princess spokesperson went on to explain “They’ll focus on lifestyle and travel press and the development of initiatives that will take advantage of the real interest in social media [...]

This year there has been a lot of competition among cruise lines on who can provide the best rooms for low prices. Norwegians newest Caribbean ship is trying something new.
They will have one large, luxurious, communal living room and around it there will be 128 very small, studio cabins designed for young cruisers. The studio will be quite small, only 100 square feet. They will have a TV, pillows, and bolsters that turn around into a bed. The small room will have several lighting options and the living room will be available only to studio passengers. Norwegian is attempting revolutionary [...]

It was an ugly mess when this large Princess Cruise Line ship arrived in the port of Vancouver to discover that it had a 70 ton dead whale attached to the bow of the ship. The ship had clearly hit the whale at some part of the boats cruise through Alaska and back.
The whale was 70 feet (21 meters) long and had been stuck to the bow to such a degree that it was dragged an unknown number of miles through the sea. The whale was most likely dragged hundreds of miles. Craig Delahunt of AP television news inspected the [...]

MSC Cruises announced that they would be offering an un-paralleled blowout sale on their European voyages planned throughout the end of 2009.  This sale will offer some of the best deal on cruises that we have seen yet in this year marked by promotions and bargain sales.
This Europe-based cruise line says is offering massive markdowns on its sailings in the Mediterranean and Northern Europe that are soon to depart.  Discounts will be more than 50% take prices for a full week European cruise all the way down to $499 per person per week.  Furthermore, per MSC policy, kids ages 17 [...]