Costa Smeralda Webcam – Bow and Stern Views of an LNG Ship
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About this webcam
The Costa Smeralda Webcam shows two still cameras on board Costa Smeralda, the Excellence-class ship of Costa Cruises that entered service in December 2019. One camera looks down over the bow, the other over the stern, where the Italian flag flies above the aft decks. Because both cameras travel with the ship, the scene beyond the rail changes from one day of a cruise to the next. At sea the bow camera faces open water and the horizon, and the color of the sea follows the sky. Alongside a pier the frames can fill with concrete quays, terminal buildings, cranes and other cruise ships, while the light moves from the flat glare of midday to the long shadows of evening. The images are stills rather than video.
About Costa Smeralda
Meyer Turku built Costa Smeralda at its shipyard in Turku, Finland, as yard number 1394. Costa ordered her on June 15, 2015, her keel was laid on July 4, 2018, and she floated out on March 15, 2019. Delivery slipped behind the original schedule, and the yard handed her over on December 5, 2019. Her first cruise left Savona on December 21, 2019, and the actress Penelope Cruz christened her in the same port on February 22, 2020. In between, in January 2020, the ship spent time under a coronavirus quarantine only weeks into her career. Her name comes from the Costa Smeralda, a stretch of coast in Sardinia whose name means Emerald Coast.
The ship belongs to the Excellence class, and her sister Costa Toscana followed from the same yard two years later. Her gross tonnage is 185,010 GT. She is 337 meters (1,106 feet) long and 42 meters (138 feet) across the beam, and she draws 8.8 meters (29 feet). Twenty decks hold 2,612 passenger cabins, enough for 5,224 passengers at double occupancy and 6,554 at maximum capacity, with a crew of 1,646. Costa Smeralda flies the Italian flag, is registered in Genoa and has worked mainly in the Mediterranean.
Costa Smeralda Details
| Cruise line | Costa Cruises |
|---|---|
| Ship class | Excellence class |
| Builder | Meyer Turku, Finland |
| Delivered | December 5, 2019 |
| Gross tonnage | 185,010 GT |
| Length | 337 m (1,106 ft) |
| Beam | 42 m (138 ft) |
| Passenger capacity | 5,224 (double occupancy), 6,554 maximum |
| Crew | 1,646 |
| IMO number | 9781889 |
What Can You See on the Costa Smeralda Webcam?
The bow camera sits high above the front of the ship and looks down on the curved white foredeck, which narrows to a slim mast at the tip. Just behind the point, a recessed deck area drops below the rail, and everything past it is water or shore. Out at sea that means open water and a long horizon, with other ships appearing now and then. Approaching land, coastlines and harbor entrances can come into view ahead of the bow, and alongside a pier a long quay can run down one side of the frame.
The aft camera on the Costa Smeralda Webcam looks back over the stern. The Italian flag stands on its staff in the middle of the frame, flanked by four round enclosures ringed with glass panels, and a pale roof fills the foreground. Beyond the rail the wake can trail away across open water, while in port the view takes in harbor basins, quayside terminals and the ships berthed nearby.
CoDe, the First Design Museum at Sea
Costa Smeralda carries CoDe, the Costa Design Collection, described as the first design museum at sea. It covers 400 square meters (4,300 square feet) on Deck 7 and traces Italian creativity from the 1930s to the present day through more than 470 exhibits, from furniture to fashion. Adam Tihany of Tihany Design designed the space, and Matteo Vercelloni, an architect and design historian, selected the collection. Pieces from Italian furniture makers such as Cassina, Molteni and Paola Lenti are on show. The museum sits at the junction of the ship’s restaurant area, its casino and the Colosseo theater, a part of the ship that is rarely quiet.
LNG Power on Costa Smeralda
Costa Smeralda runs on liquefied natural gas. At delivery she was the second cruise ship in the world to be fully powered by LNG, and the first LNG-powered ship built at Meyer Turku. Four Caterpillar MaK 16VM46DF dual-fuel engines produce a combined 57,200 kW (76,700 hp). Two azimuth electric propulsion drives of 18,500 kW (24,800 hp) each turn that power into a service speed of 21.5 knots (39.8 km/h / 24.7 mph).
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Source: Costa Cruises