Cruise ship fire
As many as 3,000 Carnival cruise passengers are stuck in St. Thomas after a fire in the ships engine room erupted Monday.
As reported by Yahoo News, the Carnival Liberty caught fire after docking on the island. The cruise liner department Sunday from San Juan with 3,346 guests and 1,150 crew.
Chicago passenger Sharifa Abubaker said:
“As our shuttle was taking us up on this hill to get to the other side of the island, we could see our cruise ship from afar and there was quite a bit of smoke that was coming up.”
Abubaker said after she and her two friends enjoyed the beach, they headed back to the ship to find out what happened. They learned about the engine fire and were told they could not board.
Abubaker added:
“There are people, someone was taken away in an ambulance. There are people there just laying on the ground.”
Passengers didn’t have access to their luggage and Abubaker said some could not access medications. Passengers heard getting restless, some of the shouted in frustration, Abubaker said via phone.
“They haven’t said anything about the ship leaving the port. And this is the first stop in the seven-day cruise. I have no idea what’s happening afterwards,” said Abubaker.
Late Monday, passengers were allowed back on board. According to Carnival, passengers can use the ship as a hotel and services, including air conditioning, elevators, toilets and galleys.
“There are worse places to be stuck. I completely agree. But if you saw the mess out here, how unhappy people were, I mean, it’s just very frustrating,” said Abubaker.
A deeper technical assessment of the engine room should be completed by Tuesday morning, according to Carnival.
However, there’s still no word on when the ship will leave St. Thomas.
According to Reuters, engine room fires have disrupted other cruises in recent years. In 2013, the Carnival Triumph was rendered out of service, leaving about 4,000 people adrift in the Gulf of Mexico without power or adequate sanitation.
Later that year, a fire aboard a Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd ship forced it to dock at Freeport in the Bahamas.
In 2010, an engine fire crippled the Carnival Splendor’s propulsion system and knocked out most of its power off the Pacific coast of Mexico.
‘s time the U.S. require “all” cruise ships entering U.S. ports meet our safety and inspection standards. Most people don’t realize that nearly every cruise ship is registered outside the U.S. in an effort to avoid U.S. maintenance and safety requirements. Moreover, every cruise ship that caught fire and/or broke down in the last decade is registered offshore.
Airlines, on the other hand, must meet U.S. safety standards if they land on U.S. soil. Would you fly on planes registered offshore that didn’t have to meet U.S. maintenance and safety requirements? How big of a tragedy must we endure before this loophole is closed?
Back in the day( 80’s), the maximum on carnival ships was 1500 passengers. There were no ship fires, or airborne diseases on the ships I was on, and I was on plenty.. Each ship had different designs and themes. Now it’s cookie cutter ships, mass crowds, accidents, fires ,airborne illnesses, man overboard. Greed will get you that!