In what looks like it is out of a movie, devastating wildfires have leveled parts of the metro Los Angeles area. With the fires still raging, the latest reports are more than 2,000 buildings destroyed as hurricane force winds and an extended period of drought come together to cause widespread devastation.
Video footage of the area shows entire neighborhoods destroyed as home after home has burned to the ground.
It’s a tragic situation and one that is still ongoing. At this point there are no fewer than five named fires occurring in the greater LA area. The largest — the Palisades Fire — seems to have only been stopped by reaching the Pacific Ocean.
And yet, the geographic profile of Los Angeles causes some oddities in regards to these fires. Los Angeles has grown to butt up and around several mountainous and forested areas. It’s those areas closest to the mountains that are seeing the fires. For instance, while Pacific Palisades has been burned, large parts of Santa Monica — just a couple of miles away — aren’t even under an evacuation order at this time.
For some, they are losing everything. For others just a short distance away, the threat seems much lower.
And while the idea of cruising may not be near as important as dealing with life-threatening wildfires, for those with trips planned, they may be wondering if their cruise will go on.
No Cruise Cancellations Noted at This Time
We’ve been looking into the situation regarding cruise cancellations or delays due to the LA wildfires.
At this time, it appears that all cruises are continuing as scheduled.
The Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach are both a considerable distance from where the fires are occurring, despite being part of the greater LA area.
For instance, the Palisades Fire — the closest to the cruise ports — is roughly 25 miles away. In effect, the fire would have to travel across almost the entirety of Los Angeles to reach the ports.
Over the next several days, Carnival, Royal Caribbean, and Princess have ships scheduled to sail from the area. Carnival has the most sailings with three scheduled through the weekend. Princess and Royal Caribbean both have a single cruise slated.
Carnival’s Brand Ambassador John Heald posted on Facebook this morning that they “do not anticipate any impact to Carnival’s homeport schedule” due to the fires.
You can see his full post here:
Royal Caribbean’s Travel Updates webpage shows no current changes to the schedule. Princess shows no updates we could find either. As well, given that Carnival and Princess are part of the same parent company, we’d expect their updates to reflect Carnival.
What You Can Do if Impacted by the Fires and You Have a Cruise
Given the fires, it is likely that even if the cruise continues as scheduled there will be some passengers that are no doubt impacted. This can be as simple as having trouble getting to the port all the way to losing a home or other property.
So what should you do if you have an upcoming cruise and can’t sail?
Ideally passengers will have travel insurance, which should offer some sort of protection. Note that you’ll want to read through your policy carefully as most plans have a list of acceptable reasons to cancel your trip and receive reimbursement. (Those with “cancel for any reason” coverage can cancel simply because they don’t want to go and receive compensation.)
Another option is to simply cancel. At this late point before the cruise, it could be that you lose your cruise fare as a penalty. While that can be a considerable chunk of money, you may get back more than you realize. When cancelling a cruise, port fees, taxes, gratuities and other prepaid charges are returned to you. So you’ll lose the cruise fare, but you should receive some money back.
You can learn more about our personal experience missing a cruise and what happened next here.
If you do have an upcoming cruise, keep in mind that the cruise line will be in touch should anything change with scheduling.
