''Carnival Imagination'' (formerly ''Imagination'') was a operated by

Carnival Cruise Line Carnival Cruise Line is an international cruise line with headquarters in Doral, Florida. The company is a subsidiary of Carnival Corporation & plc. Its logo is a funnel (ship), funnel shaped like a whale's tail, with a red, white, and blue colo ...

from 1995 to 2020. Built by Kværner Masa-Yards at its

Helsinki New Shipyard Hietalahti shipyard (also known as Helsinki New Shipyard, ) is a shipyard in Hietalahti, Helsinki, Hietalahti, in downtown Helsinki, Finland. Since 2019, it has been operated by a company named Helsinki Shipyard (company), Helsinki Shipyard. H ...

Helsinki Helsinki () is the Capital city, capital and most populous List of cities and towns in Finland, city in Finland. It is on the shore of the Gulf of Finland and is the seat of southern Finland's Uusimaa region. About people live in the municipali ...

, Finland, she was floated out on July 1, 1995, and christened ''Imagination'' by Jodi Dickinson. During 2007, in common with all of her ''Fantasy''-class sisters, she had the prefix ''Carnival'' added to her name. The ship underwent an extensive multimillion-dollar renovation in September 2016. Due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

, Carnival Cruise Line suspended all North American itineraries from March 14 to April 10, 2020. In July 2020, as a result of Carnival Cruise Line reducing fleet capacity, ''Carnival Imagination'' entered a long term lay-up status, with no planned date for the ship to enter back into service. By August 26, 2020, the vessel had filed a cruise plan for Aliağa, Turkey, the location of several

ship breaking Ship breaking (also known as ship recycling, ship demolition, ship scrapping, ship dismantling, or ship cracking) is a type of ship disposal involving the breaking up of ships either as a source of Interchangeable parts, parts, which can be sol ...

facilities. Some industry sources indicated that the vessel would be scrapped. The vessel arrived in Aliağa on September 14, 2020 and was beached on 16 September. From September 2020 until February 2023 she remained beached awaiting scrapping; some sources claimed that an unnamed hotel had been trying to acquire some of her fittings that would otherwise be damaged or destroyed during the scrapping process. The scrapping process began in February 2023. Carnival Imagination PortMiami 2011

Areas of operation

Prior to entering into a long term lay-up in July 2020, she sailed three- and four-day itineraries from

Long Beach Long Beach is a coastal city in southeastern Los Angeles County, California, United States. It is the list of United States cities by population, 44th-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 451,307 as of 2022. A charter ci ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

, to Catalina Island, California, and to Ensenada, Baja California, Mexico.

Incidents

Collision with Carnival Fantasy

In July 2011, '' Carnival Fantasy'' struck ''Carnival Imagination'' while performing a maneuver for mooring. ''Carnival Imagination'' was docked when the incident occurred. Minor hull damage was sustained to both ships' sterns, and no injuries were reported.

Coronavirus Pandemic

During the

coronavirus Coronaviruses are a group of related RNA viruses that cause diseases in mammals and birds. In humans and birds, they cause respiratory tract infections that can range from mild to lethal. Mild illnesses in humans include some cases of the comm ...

pandemic A pandemic ( ) is an epidemic of an infectious disease that has a sudden increase in cases and spreads across a large region, for instance multiple continents or worldwide, affecting a substantial number of individuals. Widespread endemic (epi ...

, the

CDC The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the national public health agency of the United States. It is a United States federal agency under the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and is headquartered in Atlanta, ...

reported, as early as April 22, 2020, that at least one person who tested positive for

SARS-CoV-2 Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2) is a strain of coronavirus that causes COVID-19, the respiratory illness responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. The virus previously had the Novel coronavirus, provisional nam ...

had tested positive within 14 days after disembarking.

Sale of the vessel

Carnival announced to investors in late July 2020 that it planned to remove the "less efficient" of its ships from the fleet; most of the 15 would be sold and a few would be "recycled". While the ''Carnival Imagination'' had been said to be heading for long-term layup, some industry insiders believed that Carnival would dispose of this vessel. In late August, media reports indicated the ship had filed a plan to travel to Aliağa, Turkey, where she would likely be scrapped. '' Carnival Fantasy'' and '' Carnival Inspiration'' were already at the scrap yards in that city. The ship left the US for the last time on August 27, 2020 heading towards Aliağa. She arrived at Aliağa on September 14, 2020. Based on a photograph accompanying an article in ''The New York Times'' October 30, 2020 entitled
Where Cruise Ships Go to Die
the Carnival Imagination is being scrapped in Aliaga, Turkey.

Citations

References

External links

Carnival Imagination official website
{{Authority control

Imagination Imagination is the production of sensations, feelings and thoughts informing oneself. These experiences can be re-creations of past experiences, such as vivid memories with imagined changes, or completely invented and possibly fantastic scenes ...

Ships built in Helsinki 1994 ships