CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (WSVN) — The Disney Dream set sail from Port Canaveral this weekend in a simulated voyage.
The passengers on the cruise that set off from Florida Saturday afternoon are all Disney employees.
The volunteers tested the waters of the ship’s health and safety guidelines to see when real trips can start up again.
“They’re just following in the footsteps of some of the other cruise lines,” said theme park expert Matt Roseboom. “Carnival’s starting out of Port Canaveral later this month, Royal Caribbean’s already started up, I think Crystal has, too.”
Roseboom said Disney has likely been delaying their restart because they want to be extra cautious.
“They got a lot to consider with all their activities and the kids on board, as well,” he said.
The Disney Dream’s last scheduled test sailing in late June was cancelled after five out of nearly 600 crew members on the ship tested positive for COVID-19.
Port Canaveral’s CEO says they want to make sure everything goes right on these simulated sailings.
“If you have one case pop up, you immediately go to red, and the ship is in a quarantine status for, I believe it’s 14 — it was 30 days, now I believe it’s 14 days before you can get another test, get the ship clean and start the simulated voyage,” said Captain John Murray.
Murray said the cruise lines have a lot of hurdles to clear.
“There was one ship this past week that was stopped from doing a simulated sailing because they had a couple of cases on board,” he said. “Similarly, there was another ship that sailed as a red ship with revenue passengers on board, so it’s a difficult environment to operate under, and I sympathize with all of the cruise lines trying to navigate this, because it’s not easy.”
Roseboom said Disney wants to make sure their cruises continue to be enjoyed by the young and young at heart.
“We love Disney cruises. My wife and I will go. Our son is 22 years old, but we’ll still go on the Disney cruises. He’ll love it just as much as he did when he was 12,” he said.
The Disney Dream’s last sailing was in March 2020.
Disney has not announced when it plans to resume sailing with paying passengers.
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