Carnival To Acquire Costa Luminosa Cruise Ship This Year

(12:45 p.m. EDT) – Carnival Cruise Line announced it will welcome Costa Cruises' Costa Luminosa into its fleet in September. Renamed Carnival Luminosa, the 97,720-gross-ton ship is scheduled to kick off guest operations in November 2022 from Brisbane, Australia.

Now that it will acquire Costa Luminosa , Carnival replaces its original plan to incorporate Costa Magica into its fleet, which will now remain with Costa Cruises.

Carnival Luminosa will operate seasonally from Brisbane from October through April 2023, and then reposition to Seattle, where it will embark on seasonal Alaska itineraries from May through September 2023. Existing cruise itineraries for Costa Luminosa will be canceled from September forward, with Costa contacting affected passengers.

Costa Luminosa entered service in 2009 and accommodates up to 2,826 guests and 1,050 crew members.

"With our full fleet back to guest operations and the pent-up demand for Carnival we are seeing every week aboard our ships, the chance to expand with (Costa) Luminosa and then the arrival of Carnival Celebration in November provides our guests with more choices and new ways to enjoy a Carnival vacation," said Christine Duffy, president of Carnival Cruise Line.

Costa Luminosa is a hybrid Spirit and Vista class ship, similar to the four Spirit-class ships already in service for Carnival – Carnival Spirit, Carnival Pride, Carnival Legend and Carnival Miracle. The vessel also shares some exterior design similarities with Holland America Line's initial Vista-class ships, such as 2002's Zuiderdam.

"Our Spirit class ships are very popular with our guests and Luminosa will be a great addition given the large number of balcony cabins which make her an ideal ship for this deployment," added Duffy. "And equally important, this will allow Carnival to finally start our highly anticipated itineraries from Brisbane, so we’ll have two ships operating in Australia for the high season Down Under."

Carnival passengers took to Cruise Critic’s Community Forums to share and discuss the news of Costa Luminosa’s incorporation into Carnival’s fleet.

"This is exciting news for me and a lot more as I have been waiting for an announcement like this for a while," writes CarnivalShips480.

Exact itineraries for Carnival Luminosa have not yet been loaded onto Carnival's website.