ROCKLAND, Maine — The Queen Mary 2 may make a port call to Rockland in 2018, making it the largest cruise ship ever to visit the midcoast city.
Rockland Harbor Master Matthew Ripley said Tuesday that a shipping agent contacted him to request a mooring area for the Queen Mary 2 for Sept. 25, 2018.
A telephone call Wednesday to shipping agent Chase Leavitt & Co. of Portland was not returned.
The Queen Mary 2 is 1,132 feet long and can carry more than 2,600 passengers and a crew of 1,250.
The city has seen large cruise ships arriving during the past several years. The largest cruise ship to make a stop in Rockland so far has been the 962-foot-long Jewel of the Seas in October 2009. The city also has regular smaller cruise ships arrive during the summer and fall.
Amy Powers, director of CruiseMaineUSA, the state’s cruise ship marketing entity, would not comment on the possible stop of the Queen Mary 2 for 2018, pointing out that the Cunard Cruise Line has not posted the visit on its website.
The state’s cruise ship season got underway on April 29, when the Veendam pulled into Frenchman Bay and dropped anchor, bringing the first of about 160,000 cruise ship passengers expected to visit Bar Harbor, the state’s busiest ship port, this year.
Overall, 376 cruise ship visits carrying a projected statewide total of more than 283,000 passengers are expected to be spread out among nine Maine ports this year, according to CruiseMaineUSA. That passenger count would represent a state increase of 6 percent over the statewide cruise passenger total from 2015, CruiseMaine indicated in a prepared statement released in the spring.
Cruise Lines International Association has indicated that direct spending in Maine in 2014 by cruise ship companies and passengers contributed $47 million to the state’s economy, representing an increase of $800,000 from the year before. Of that $47 million, $26 million is believed to have been spent on wages that supported an estimated 755 cruise industry related jobs in the state.
According to the association’s 2014 report, cruise ship passengers on average spent a little more than $120 in each port they visited.
Rockland is expected to get 33 cruise ship visits in 2016. Among them are the 590-foot M/S Regatta, scheduled to stop in Rockland on Sept. 22, and the 610-foot Silver Whisper on Oct. 6.
In 2017, the 915-foot Rhapsody of the Seas is scheduled to stop in Rockland on Sept. 12, the Silver Whisper again on Oct. 15, the 965-foot Norwegian Gem on Oct. 19, and the Rhapsody of the Seas on Oct. 20.