RCCL said to be close to ordering third Oasis class ship

[Jason]

Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd (RCCL), the second largest cruise shipping group in the world, is reportedly close to placing an order for a third Oasis class cruise ship with STX Finland’s Turku shipyard, a Finnish media report says.

The fate of the project depends largely on finance and the Finnish government’s economic affairs committee will discuss the matter in its meeting tomorrow Thursday, the Turun Sanomat daily reports. It does not disclose the source of its information.

STX Finland, which is part of the South Korea based STX Business Group’s STX Europe shipbuilding unit, has built two 226,000 gross ton Oasis class vessels for Royal Caribbean International, the contemporary market unit in the RCCL group.

Both vessels operate year-round in the Caribbean and the US source market has performed quite well in recent times is terms of yields and booking levels, cruise industry companies have said.

By Kari Reinikainen, Cruise Business Review

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[WeCruiseToo]

While we wouldn’t be opposed to another Oasis-class ship (we really like Oasis and Allure of the Seas) they’ve been out long enough that another one now feels sort of “been there, done that”. Hopefully they could include enough changes to make it feel fresh.

[DebbieandJerry]

The Oasis was in Ft Lauderdale the same time as the Carnival Freedom when we were leaving for our cruise. The Allure was there when we got back. I took pictures of both vessels. They are huge. Way too much for me!

[sailingrose]

Love the Freedom class but Oasis class is too big........not interested.

[WeCruiseToo]

True, the Oasis-class ships are enormous, but we thought they actually felt less crowded than Freedom-class or Voyager-class ships. They’re laid out so well they actually reminded us more of Royal Caribbean’s Radiance-class ships!

Edited October 12, 2012 by WeCruiseToo