Cruise line Mystic Cruises, a brand of Portuguese financial holding Mystic Invest, has ordered two polar expedition vessels from compatriot West Sea shipyard.
The vessels are worth EUR 140 million (USD 158.4 million), according to Mystic Invest.
The newbuilds — to be named World Voyager and World Navigator — are part of the company’s Ice Class, Explorer range ships and are slated for delivery in 2020 and 2021.
With a reinforced hull designed to navigate polar waters, of up to one meter of ice density, each of the ships will be able to accommodate 200 passengers and 110 crew members.
Sustainability and ecological safety is also a concern in the design of these expedition cruise ships.
“To reduce our impact, we worked with Rolls-Royce to integrate … hybrid propulsion system that … reduces fuel consumption and CO2 emissions, as well as a dynamic positioning system that allows us to avoid using anchors, thereby protecting the maritime environment,” Mário Ferreira, CEO of Mystic Cruises, said.
The two new ships will join the World Explorer, a 9,300-ton vessel currently under construction at the abovementioned yard. Scheduled to start operations in April 2019, World Explorer will be chartered out to Nicko Cruises and Quark Expeditions.
“Given the current market demand, we believed it important to anticipate our expansion project for Mystic Cruises by a few years,” Ferreira continued.
“We have chartered the entire inventory on Antarctica cruises aboard the World Explorer until 2023, and are fully booked on the majority of our other 2019 departures. The cruises to the Arctic, Norwegian Fjords, Greenland and Baltic are a huge success on the German market, where Mystic Cruises’ sister company, Nicko Cruises, operates World Explorer voyages. With this positive scenario, it was essential to move forward with the construction of more ships, these being the first s of a fleet of 10 Ocean vessels that we intend to develop and build,” Ferreira explained.