LONG BEACH, Calif. — Carnival Cruise Line will send its 2019 newbuild here directly from the shipyard, marking the first time in two decades that Carnival has homeported a new ship on the West Coast.
The ship, the Carnival Panorama, will be the third in a class that started with the Carnival Vista in 2016.
Carnival president Christine Duffy announced the deployment at a ceremony to dedicate Carnival's expanded terminal here. She said the decision underscores Carnival's ambitions for the Southern California gateway.
"I think this demonstrates to everyone the commitment that we at Carnival have made to the West Coast operation," Duffy said.
"I'm sure for travel agents in this community it will be a great opportunity to sell even more people on cruising," she said.
Duffy also disclosed that Carnival will make a big investment to upgrade the passenger experience in Ensenada, Mexico, a stop featured on all Carnival three- and four-day cruises out of Long Beach.
The Ensenada improvements, which will include both indoor and outdoor features, are expected to be finished by 2020. Duffy said details would be forthcoming.
Betsy Geiser, vice president at Uniglobe Travel in Irvine, Calif., said the Ensenada upgrades will be especially welcome for repeat passengers. "Everybody who cruises out of Southern California has been there 20 times," she said.
For the past 15 years, Carnival's operation in Southern California has been separate from those of other cruise lines. It's located in a large geodesic dome that was commissioned in 1980 to house the Howard Hughes-designed "Spruce Goose" aircraft.
Since moving here in 2003, the cruise line has been limited to only 45% of the 146,000-square-foot dome, with exhibitions and a holiday ice sculpture attraction in the other part. Carnival gained tenancy of the entire building last year and began using the expanded terminal on Jan. 25.
Carnival can now board and disembark passengers simultaneously. In the past, arriving passengers sometimes had to queue outside the building while ships were emptied.
Carnival is using the expanded terminal to debut a streamlined mobile check-in, which in most cases enables staff to swipe identification with a mobile device and take an ID card photo in a minute or two.
"With our new embarkation technology, people are able with just a swipe to come in and relax before they board the ship," Duffy said.
The enlarged terminal also affords more room and a better setup for Customs and Border Protection.
Carnival has also created elaborate theming for the dome's cavernous interior, with a 30-foot-high photomural of Thunder Mountain in California's Sierra Nevada range and dozens of freeze-dried trees for decoration.
A scale model of the Spruce Goose, or H-4 Hercules, that was flown in the Hughes biopic "The Aviator" has been installed, and embarking passengers have begun posing with it for photos.
The Spruce Goose, hangered in Long Beach from 1983 to 1992, was a prototype built from wood that had the largest wingspan of any plane ever flown. After one brief flight in Long Beach in 1947, it was not selected for production.
Securing access to all of the former aircraft hangar was essential to Carnival's plan to base bigger ships in California. The 3,960-passenger Panorama is 32% bigger than the Carnival Splendor, which sails weekly from Long Beach.
"We believe there is a population — a significant population — that can drive to this terminal in a half a day or less," Duffy said. "This is really just the beginning and a foundation for the future growth we have envisioned on the West Coast."