Norwegian Star Severe Listing
Cruise Ship Sailing Off Mexico
October 25, 2007
Norwegian Cruise Lines has not said a word about the severe listing of their Norwegian Star cruise ship this past week.
Passengers on a Mexican Riviera cruise report that ship suddenly listed and tossed passengers, cabin contents, deck furniture, common area furnishings and pool contents when the ship leaned onto her side.
Cruise Line: Norwegian Cruise Lines
Ship: Nowegian Star
Built: 2001
Refurbished: 2004
Registry: Bahamas
Size: 91,000 Gross Tons
Length: 965 Feet
Passengers: 2,240
Crew: 1100
Mexico Webcams > Here
Passengers who were in elevators at the times said the pool water ran into the elevator and they got wet.
Passengers report two announcements by Captain Lars regarding the incident. The ship was apparently sailing at 25 knots when they came upon a Humpback Whale pod that passengers were watching.
The crew on the bridge made a sharp turn to avoid ramming one of the whales and then over-correct to right the vessel, with the result of tossed everything onboard about. Apparently saving the whales was more important than 2,000 passengers onboard.
Other passengers reported the captain said it was human error, which would make sense since the ship didn't take the evasive action by herself.
Depending where passengers were on the ship, played a roll in how severe the listing felt to them. Those higher in the ship would have felt the roll more significantly than those lower in the ship.
There are reports of severe injuries, bruises and injuries requiring stitches and the ship was delayed getting into Acapulco by about 30 minutes as the crew frantically cleaned up the ship before arriving in port.
Norwegian Star was on an eight day cruise that departed from Los Angeles, California on October 23. The ship left Los Angeles at 4pm on day 1 with two days at sea then stopping at Acapulco, Mexico for day 4 and 5.
After that, the ship was to go to Zihuatanejom Mexico, Puerto Vallarta, Mexico and Cabo San Lucas, Mexico before returning to Los Angeles on October 31.
In recent years there has been an increasing problem with cruise ship rolling onto their sides and tossing everything onboard about. You can read about the other cases by clicking here.
