Costa Serena Cross Section Arrives

The fore end section of the Costa Serena arrived in Fincantieri’s Sestri Ponente shipyards in Genoa recently. The Costa Serena is the second of Costa Crociere’s three new sister ships due to enter service over the next four years.

The fore end section of the new building is about 91 m in length and 3,200 gt. It left the Palermo yard, where it was assembled, on February 1, and will now be placed in the building graving-dock at the Sestri Ponente yard; there, it will be fitted to the aft end section of the ship, which is currently under construction. The cut of the first plates of Costa Serena started in April 2005.

The Costa Serena is the second of three 112,000 gt sister ships with guest capacity of 3,780 ordered by Costa Crociere from Fincantieri and entailing a total investment of almost 1.5 billion euros. The first of the three, the Costa Concordia, will enter into service in July 2006; the Costa Serena in May 2007; the third vessel, whose name is yet to be announced, will be completed in summer 2009.

Thanks to the arrival of these three new ships, the fleet bearing the Costa Crociere brand, currently Europe’s largest and most advanced, will be 13 strong by 2009, with an increase in capacity of over 50%.