Carnival Rolls Out $300M In Improvements Aimed At Avoiding Future Poop Cruises

Warning: this logo may cause nautical anxiety.

Warning: this logo may cause nautical anxiety.

Now that Carnival Cruise lines has found its name irrevocably linked with Poop Cruises, the company has apparently realized it’s got some work to do — both on its public image and on all those ships that keep malfunctioning. Carnival announced today that it has plans in the works involving $300 million in improvements to its entire fleet.

The money will be sunk into upgrading safety and creating redundant power systems, according to a press release on Carnival’s site (via Good Morning America), ostensibly so that if one engine fails the entire ship won’t be thrown into a state of septic emergency due to overflowing toilets.

Included in today’s improvements is a system-wide increase in emergency generator power across Carnival’s fleet of 24 ships and additional investments in the newest and most technically advanced fire prevention, detection and suppression systems.

“Although every ship in our fleet currently has emergency back-up power which is designed to enable the continuous operation of safety equipment and some hotel services, it is our intent to significantly bolster that back-up power to support the core hotel services. With this improvement, we will better ensure guest comfort in the rare instance of a loss of main power,” said Gerry Cahill, president and CEO of Carnival Cruise Lines.

Carnival also announced a new Safety & Reliability Review Board that consists of “outside experts with significant expertise in marine and occupational safety, reliability and maintenance, marine regulatory compliance and quality control/assurance.”

In addition, Carnival is going to spend somewhere upward of another $600 million to improve its ships overall and make sure the sewagepalooza that struck the Carnival Triumph in February doesn’t happen on future trips.

Carnival is the world’s largest operator of cruise ships, with brands like the Princess (which had its own Poop Cruise event recently) and Cunard in its family, as well as the ill-fated Costa Concordia. That ship didn’t suffer from a power failure, but hit rocks off the coast of Italy while the captain was trying to give passengers a thrill. Instead of a nice view, the ship sank, killing 32 people.

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