Costa Pacifica

Overview

Costa Pacifica is a Concordia-class cruise ship operated by Costa Cruises (Costa Crociere). Handed over by Fincantieri in May 2009, she was the third ship of the class built for Costa, following Costa Concordia and Costa Serena. She is known across the fleet as "the music ship": her interiors are themed on music of every era and genre, her public rooms carry the names of songs and styles, and she was the first cruise ship to carry a professional recording studio in which passengers could record themselves.

She is also, inevitably, a surviving member of the class defined by its lead ship's loss: Costa Concordia's sinking in 2012 made the Concordia class the most scrutinised design in modern cruising, and Pacifica has spent the second half of her career as one of the class's working ambassadors. She has carried one name and one operator throughout.

Key specifications

The dataset records Costa Pacifica at 114,500 GT, 290.0 m long and 35.5 m in beam (her article gives 36 m), with a maximum capacity of 3,780 passengers and a speed of 21.5 knots, with a maximum of about 23 knots. She has 14 passenger decks, 17 in total. Power comes from six Wärtsilä 12V46 engines of 12,600 kW each in a diesel-electric arrangement. Her reported build cost was about €500 million, and her crew is about 1,100.

Design and construction

Pacifica was ordered on 14 December 2005 and built by Fincantieri at its Sestri Ponente yard in Genoa as hull number 6148. She was launched on 30 June 2008 — the dataset records 2009, her delivery year. The Concordia class was itself a development, through Carnival's Conquest class, of the Destiny platform: a large, high-density resort ship with a terraced pool deck, a multi-deck atrium and the group's standard machinery arrangement, scaled to about 114,500 GT for Costa's European market.

Naming, launch and maiden voyage

The ship was delivered on 29 May 2009 and christened on 5 June 2009 at Genoa in a dual ceremony with her near-contemporary Costa Luminosa — two Costa ships named in a single event. Her maiden voyage followed on 6 June 2009, the date the dataset records by year.

Career by operator

She is registered at Genoa under the Italian flag. Her career overlapped the defining event in her class's history — the loss of Costa Concordia in January 2012 — after which Costa's surviving Concordia-class ships continued in service under the intensified safety regime the disaster produced across the industry. Pacifica's own deployment has followed the line's standard pattern, centred on the Mediterranean and seasonal long-haul programmes including South America, without sale, charter or rename.

Onboard character

The music theme, executed by Carnival Corporation's long-time interior architect Joe Farcus, runs through the whole ship: Italian composer Mauro Pagani wrote music specifically for her, the décor references classical, rock, jazz and musical theatre, the atrium displays antique violins and printed scores, and the ship carries some 308 original artworks and 5,929 prints. The signature novelty was the recording studio — passengers could cut their own record — alongside the Samsara Spa and, a period marker in itself, a PlayStation World gaming area built around the PS3 consoles of the day. She is a textbook example of the 2000s Costa formula: one strong organising theme carried through every public room. The physical plant behind the theme was equally of its era: nine pools and whirlpools, two main dining rooms plus a large buffet and a set of speciality venues, a large theatre, disco and casino, and eleven bars and lounges — the full big-ship resort inventory, delivered in an Italian-market ship whose announcements were made in five languages.

Major refits and incidents

In December 2012, at Marseille, Pacifica suffered serious hull damage in extreme winds when a marker buoy broke free and was driven into her side, leaving long gashes in the plating low in the hull and damaging her bow thrusters; temporary plate repairs in Marseille and Palermo kept her sailing through the holiday cruises, followed by emergency drydock repairs in January–February 2013. A measles outbreak among her crew was reported in 2014, with 59 crew cases recorded in one incident listing. She was refurbished in 2017, a routine mid-life refresh of accommodation and public areas. No other major casualty attaches to her.

Sister ships and class

The Concordia class built for Costa comprises Costa Concordia (2006, lost in 2012 and dismantled), Costa Serena (2007), Costa Pacifica (2009), and the modified pair Costa Favolosa (2011) and Costa Fascinosa (2012). Carnival Splendor (2008) is a close relative, built to a Concordia-derived design for Carnival Cruise Line. The class's hull and arrangement descend from Carnival's Destiny and Conquest classes.

Fate and where she is now

Costa Pacifica remains in active service with Costa Cruises under her original name — the middle ship of a five-ship class, and the one that has come to represent its everyday, post-2012 working life.

Sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cruise_ships, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Costa_Pacifica