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Babzee

These Luxury Cruise Ships Are Being Sold For Scrap Metal

From afar, the cruise ships in these photos almost look like toys, perhaps LEGO models being taken apart for new creations. But these are not toys; they’re real cruise ships. They’re being broken down for scrap metal as yet another casualty of the novel coronavirus pandemic, which has docked ships across the globe.As many of you probably know, it wasn’t always like this for cruise ships. Life pre-coronavirus, which seems like ages ago, painted a picture of a very vibrant industry (even though it’s actually rotten to its core.) According to CNN, the cruise industry had 30 million passengers in 2019. It was a $150 billion industry that employed 1.2 million people. This rosy tale of success came to a screeching halt when the coronavirus started appearing on ships and spread like wildfire.Some of the earliest images we have of the health apocalypse we’re currently living in are from cruises. Then there were horror stories of ships, some with and some without passengers, being stranded at sea and not being allowed to dock at their destinations. On March 14, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a “No Sail Order” for cruise ships because of covid-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, which suspended passenger operations on cruise ships with the capacity to carry at least 250 passengers in U.S. waters.At the end of September, the CDC extended its “No Sail Order” through Oct. 31. The agency said that cruise ship travel “continues to transmit and amplify the spread” of the coronavirus, and “would likely spread the infection into communities” if passenger operations were allowed to resume prematurely. It also highlighted the fact that cruises that have resumed operations in foreign countries have continued to have outbreaks, despite extensive safety protocols.