Carnival Cruise Lines today announced the appointment of Carlos Torres de Navarra to the newly-created position of vice president, commercial port operations.  In this capacity, he will oversee homeport and port-of-call operations for the cruise line’s 23-ship fleet, as well as port-related strategic planning, agreements and relationships.

The new position and a subsequent reorganization of the port operations and nautical operations functions currently overseen by Captain Domenico Tringale, vice president of port operations, have resulted following the announced retirement plans of Captain Tringale.  Also retiring is Gordon Buck, vice president of Caribbean relations.  Tringale will retire in spring 2012 following a maritime career spanning more than 50 years, including 11 years with Carnival Cruise Lines.  Buck will retire in early 2012 following a 33-year career with Carnival Cruise Lines.  Tringale and Buck will continue to provide support within their respective areas during the transition period.

Torres de Navarra will assume responsibility for commercial port operations effective November 7 and will report to Gus Antorcha, senior vice president of guest commerce.  Leadership for the nautical operations area, including oversight of navigational aspects related to port and itinerary planning, and irregular operations, will report to Martin Landtman, senior vice president of marine operations, and will be announced in the near feature.

 Torres de Navarra was most recently senior director of port destination and development for Carnival Corporation & plc, the parent company of Carnival Cruise Lines.  Prior to that, he spent seven years with Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd., most recently as assistant treasurer.  Torres de Navarra also served as manager of international finance for W.R. Grace & Company.  He holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in business administration from the University of Miami.

“Carlos has an outstanding and diverse professional background that makes him extremely well-suited to lead our new commercial port operations function,” said Ruben Rodriguez, executive vice president of ship operations for Carnival Cruise Lines.  “We are well familiar with his exceptional work at Carnival Corporation & plc, leading very large and complex port destination development projects, and we look forward to benefitting from his exceptional leadership skills in his new role at Carnival Cruise Lines.”

Rodriguez added, “We are extremely grateful to Domenico Tringale and Gordon Buck for their many years of service and outstanding contributions to Carnival Cruise Lines.  We wish them both the very best in their retirement.”