Port Canaveral reopens to cruise traffic after one-day shutdown due to Hurricane Helene

(This story has been updated to note that the port has reopened.)

Port Canaveral reopened Friday morning after being closed since early Thursday, as Hurricane Helene brushed by Brevard County.

The U.S. Coast Guard cleared the port to reopen after crews completed inspecting the channel at Port Canaveral for shoaling and debris.

Port officials say there were no issues the crews found that would prevent the reopening of the port. Teams from Port Canaveral, the Canaveral Pilots Association and the Coast Guard were doing the inspections of the port channel to assure that it was safe for cruise and cargo vessels to sail through.

The shutdown of Port Canaveral disrupted cruise ship schedules at the port, with the delayed return of five ships at the end of their cruises on Thursday and Friday. The ships that were delayed began sailing into port Friday morning.

Meanwhile, the port's Jetty Park campground area was experiencing a power outage Friday morning. Florida Power & Light crews restored power to Jetty Park around noon.

The port closed the 188-campsite Jetty Park facility Wednesday in advance of the storm. Jetty Park was at 35% occupancy when the closing order was issued.

Jetty Park is reopening to campers on Saturday.

Affected ships

The cruise ship most affected by the Port Canaveral shutdown was the MSC Seashore , whose scheduled return to the port on Thursday morning was pushed back a day, meaning the ship's next scheduled cruise departure on Thursday afternoon also was delayed by a day.

Affected to a lesser degree were four cruise ships scheduled to arrive at Port Canaveral to complete their cruises on Friday morning and to depart on their next cruises Friday afternoon. The ships are Carnival's Glory, Disney's Wish, and Royal Caribbean's Adventure of the Seas and Utopia of the Seas. Their arrivals at Port Canaveral, scheduled for early Friday morning, were delayed by several hours, and so were their scheduled Friday afternoon departures.

One cargo vessel also had been delayed from docking at Port Canaveral. The Corinthian Spire, which is carrying lumber, had been scheduled to arrive at the port Thursday evening. It now is due into port on Saturday.

The Port Canaveral-based Victory 2 gambling ship has been undergoing a regularly scheduled dry-dock maintenance since Sept. 8 in Charleston, South Carolina, so its sailings out of Port Canaveral were not affected by Helene. The ship is scheduled to resume sailing from Port Canaveral on Oct. 3.

Sixteen shrimp boats were riding out the storm Thursday, docked at Port Canaveral. They typically would be shrimping in the Gulf of Mexico, the Florida Keys or the Atlantic Ocean. With the reopening of the port, they were expected to sail out to the shrimping areas on Friday.

Port restaurants and other businesses were not required to close because of the storm.

Dave Berman is business editor at FLORIDA TODAY. Contact Berman at dberman@floridatoday.com , on X at @bydaveberman and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/dave.berman.54

This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Port Canaveral reopens to cruise traffic after one-day shutdown due to Hurricane Helene