Cruise Ship Overboards - Enough Already?
Yesterday the U.S. Coast Guard located a Royal Caribbean crew member who reportedly jumped off of the Majesty of the Seas around 4:30 a.m. as the cruise ship approached Miami.
Thirty-one-year-old Robert Mado was found treading water off Cutler Bay about two hours after the Royal Caribbean cruise ship issued a distress call Friday morning. Crew member Mado was an assistant purser on the cruise ship.
Royal Caribbean claims that witnesses watched Mr. Mado jump overboard.
This sounds rather strange - why would several crew members be awake and on the deck at 4:30 in the morning?
There are a lot of questions surrounding this overboard - the twenty-fourth from a cruise ship this year alone.
Did he really jump? Why? We know first hand that many crew members face a great deal of stress caused by working long hours, seven days a week, away from their families. Working on cruise ships operated by Royal Caribbean - which is experiencing financial problems - can be particularly stressful. But who knows exactly what happened?
The good news is that crew member Mado is recovering and apparently is in good condition.
Jaunted - the pop culture travel site - has an interesting perspective of "man overboards" in an article entitled "Enough With People Jumping Off Cruise Ships Already!" The article contains a lot of erroneous information, such as suggesting that the majority of overboards are suicides or intentional jumps. But there is one thing that Jaunted has absolutely right:
. . . as long as the cruise industry grows, the number of people who go overboard will grow as well . . .
Credit:
"Overboard Catcher" drawing Roque Mocán Quan
