Luis Cortes
Family Abandoned In Bahamas By Royal Caribbean
April 22, 2008
When a family of five get on a Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines voyage, the last thing expected was to be evicted from the ship in a foreign land at 11pm at night, with a baby only seven months old. But, that unfortunately is what happened to the Cortez family, and they are fuming mad.
Zoie, their baby, only a little over half a year old, became ill aboard while enroute to the Bahamas. She was vomiting and had diarrhea. The mistake the family made was taking Zoie to the doctor aboard the ship, who came to the conclusion that Zoie had the dreaded Norovirus, and would infect masses of passengers and crew aboard the ship. The doctor claimed the child was dehydrated, but that is not what the doctor in the hospital emergency room said.
Security came to the family and gave them 10 minutes to grab their bags and then ordered them off the ship, way past the children's bedtime. Mrs Cortes was in her pajamas, and they wouldn't even let her change into her street clothes. (I'd see the day).
Once at the hospital on shore, the doctor said that Zoie only had a cold, and was not dehydrated. The Cortes family was removed the ship for nothing.
The Cortes family, alone and in shock, roamed the streets with their small children in tow, trying to find the American Embassy. Once there, they got slammed with a $455 fee for passports so they could fly home.
The plane tickets cost the family another $650 and before they could leave the hospital they had to dish out another $600. The cost of this 5-day cruise had skyrocketed to over $3000.
Royal Caribbean, though they made the decision to evict the family from their cabin beds, only offered to give them credit for another cruise, not to compensate them for the costs they incurred as a result of medical malpractice.
