Royal Caribbean has paid tribute to Co-Founder Arne Wilhelmsen, who passed away at the weekend in Palma, Spain, aged 90.
Wilhelmsen was a Royal Caribbean board member for over three decades until 2003. He helped start Royal Caribbean in 1968 in partnership with two other Norwegian shipping firms. He was also at the forefront of the modern cruise industry and helped put Miami on the map as the world’s cruising capital.
RCL Chairman and CEO Richard Fain paid tribute to RCI Co-Founder Arne Wilhelmsen: “At a time when the rest of the world thought cruising was a niche use for old transatlantic liners, Arne was already seeing glimmers of the growth that was possible.
“He had a vision of the modern cruise industry when the `industry’ might have been a dozen used ships, total.”
