Oil price surge ends 'never-ending' cruise as Odyssey passengers are put ashore in Cambodia
US-based Villa Vie Residences has ended the voyage of its residential cruise ship MV Odyssey and put passengers ashore at Sihanoukville, Cambodia, after fuel costs became unaffordable following the start of the Iran war. The company will assess restructuring options over the next 60 days.
More than 200 passengers of the MV Odyssey cruise ship have been put ashore in the Cambodian port city of Sihanoukville because the vessel's owner, Florida-based Villa Vie Residences, can no longer pay for fuel. The ship was designed as a permanent home at sea, and its residents must now find temporary housing on land.
What the company said
On Tuesday the company said the sharp rise in oil prices had put it under unsustainable financial pressure. By its figures, monthly fuel costs per cabin in parts of Asia had climbed from $1,800 to as much as $8,000. It said it had tried to cut consumption since the conflict began in late February, by slowing the itinerary and spending more time in port, but that this was not enough. Over the next 60 days it will evaluate restructuring and recapitalisation options.
Passengers were told to leave the ship within hours and were taken by bus into the city. They say the company has provided no financial aid and not even a list of hotels. It later offered tickets on a charter flight to the US, but many had already left.
What the Odyssey was
The ship first sailed from Belfast, Northern Ireland, in October 2024. A couple could join for about $319,998 for the length of a presidential term, with a permanent residency option available for an additional sum. The vessel was formerly a conventional cruise liner, MS Braemar, and is 196 metres (642ft) long. It carried 156 crew members, and the passengers were mostly Americans, many of them retirees or digital nomads.
Passenger accounts
US passenger Kit Cassingham said people were shell-shocked and crying. She and her husband Randy said that after the Iran war began, food worsened and shore excursions became fewer. In August, while docked in Singapore, passengers had already been told there was not enough money to keep cruising, and some residents contributed their own funds.
Industry analyst Prof Andrew Coggins said the episode is unlikely to deter cruise customers, noting a record 37.2 million global passengers in 2025. Villa Vie founder Mikael Petterson accepted he was the "villain in the story" but said the company would have been fine without the Iran war.
