China In New Challenge To European Yards

While the interiors and onboard facilities have been tailored to the Chinese market, Adora Magic City has Italian lines as a derivation of the Fincantieri-constructed Vista-class, and is laid out with 2,125 passenger cabins for a guest complement of between 4,250 and 5,246.

The diesel-electric newbuild will start her career operating out of the new Wusongku International Cruise Liner Terminal at Shanghai under the aegis of Adora Cruises, originally established as CSSC Carnival Cruise Shipping. Steel was cut in August 2022 for a sistership, which is scheduled to be delivered in 2025.

The meticulous sea trials programme, spanning nine days in July plus a second period in early September, is indicative of Chinese determination to ensure performance and contractual terms from the outset of its bid to become a long-term player in a high value-added field currently the province of yards in Italy, France, Germany and Finland.

The power plant in Adora Magic City is based on five medium-speed diesel generator sets of an aggregate 62,400kW maximum output, feeding the electric motors integral to a pair of Azipod azimuthing propulsion units and all other main shipboard consumers. The power concentration promises a speed of the order of 23 knots.

Adora Magic City is set to be preceded into service under the Adora Cruises banner by the former Costa Mediterranea, sailing from Tianjin as the Adora Mediterranea. The 293m vessel, built in Finland by the formerly Kvaerner Masa-owned Turku yard in 2003 and refurbished during 2020, offers accommodation for 2114-2680 passengers.

China’s shipbuilding industry has successfully focused on production of commercial vessels of all types, and of ever-increasing sophistication and outfitting intensity, for the international market. The lack of experience in the cruise shipbuilding sector, and an absence of demand for such vessels from China’s shipping industry hitherto, have so far held back Chinese yards from gaining a strong foothold in the field. However, China is one of the largest sources of cruise passengers globally, and the market in the aftermath of the Covid 19 pandemic is again on a pronounced growth trajectory. Moreover, the government sees cruising as a way to increase internal domestic spending and create a more sustainable domestic tourism sector, slowing the growth of the burgeoning Chinese foreign tourism sector.

Building a large cruise ship is an extremely complex undertaking, with completely different challenges to the construction of merchant ships and with high financial risks. As has been seen in large passengership projects at shipyards around the world, under-estimation of complexity and of the need for coordination has historically been a major contributor to cost and schedule overruns.

Part of China State Shipbuilding Corporation (CSSC), Shanghai Waigaoqiao landed the two-ship contract in November 2018 at a cost of about $1.5bn from Adora’s antecedent CSSC Carnival Cruise Shipping, a majority Chinese-owned joint undertaking of the Carnival organisation, CSSC and China Investment Corporation.

A joint venture set up by Fincantieri and CSSC Cruise Technology Development Company (CCTD) granted a technology licence for the ship model platform and has provided a series of technical services to Shanghai Waigaoqiao throughout the shipbuilding process. This has included project management, supply chain management and sales of fundamental systems and components of the ship.

The Vista-class design and its derivatives have hitherto been used in numerous vessels for Carnival brands delivered by Fincantieri’s Monfalcone and Marghera yards in Italy, culminating in a five-ship series commissioned between 2016 and 2019.

MAIN PARTICULARS – Adora Magic City