Spring Break is on the horizon and Carnival Cruises will not be hosting the lot of you.
This recent boat trip boycott brought to you by a recent nightmare at sea, when the ship, the Triumph, left the port of Galveston on Feb. 9, with more than 4,000 people aboard for a four-day cruise. After an engine fire wiped out power for three days, passengers lived with measly meals and without working toilets, lights, air-conditioner before being towed into the Mobile, Alabama, port on Valentine’s Day.
As expected, lawsuit claims seeking compensation for “emotional damages” are flooding Carnival like water to Titanic’s boiler rooms. The cruise line reimbursed its passengers for their fare, transportation costs and their on-board expenses, plus a free cruise in the future and the finishing touch of a complimentary $500.
Thankfully, this time around, shortages of lifeboats were not the source of mayhem. The lack of use perhaps was.
But unfortunately, this is not Carnival’s first hostess hiccup.
In 2010, a fire on the cruise ship the Splendor left 3,300 Carnival passengers without electricity for three days. Last year, the Italian ship Costa Concordia, under Carnival Corporation ownership, struck a rock and capsized off the coast of Italy, resulting in 32 deaths.
Whether the cruise line is run improperly or simply has a case of the Titanics, Carnival has become cozy with the term “technological malfunction.”
And the aftermath has lent no helping hand, either. Post-Triumph panic has had passengers making news appearances, retelling their tragic tail of those nights onboard, “S.O.S.” tweets and Instagrams of Spam suppers.
Can you imagine the material to surface on the iPhones of Rose and Jack?
Hysteria is bred when a mass audience is looking to be catered. The Titanic’s tragic tale gave way to an overhaul of safety regulations in the cruise-line industry. Perhaps the Triumph’s simply irritating incident should bring about changes in our reactions in the social sphere.
Because in the grand scheme, the overhyped inconvenience of the Triumph’s defeat is but a blur on cruise ship industry horizon.
According to a USA Today article, in 1980, cruise passengers totaled at 1 million worldwide. This year, projections put the number at 20 million. All this after the “unsinkable ship” of 1912 was sunk and an Oscar-winning movie to commemorate her runs every weekend on TV to remind us.
Nautical dangers are a reality and man-made devices will fail us. And we will continue to use social media platforms to embargo them both.
So please, do not cancel your voyages at sea. Test the waters. We will hoist the sails once more. Perhaps bring aboard some Lunchables for safe measures.
