Shortly after the Holland America Line (HAL)’s Westerdam caught on fire this weekend, HAL issued a press release characterizing the fire as "small" and "quickly" extinguished. It also said that it returned to port in Seattle "out of an abundance of caution."
Cruise line press statements like this rarely tell the whole story. We know…
King 5 News in Seattle reports that the Holland America Line (HAL) Westerdam caught fire this evening as it was sailing to Alaska and was forced to turn around and return to Seattle. The news station is saying that the fire broke out in the engine room.
HAL released the following statement:
"There has been…
Last year, we reported on the tragic death of 42 year old Birdie Africa, who drowned in a hot tub aboard the Carnival Dream cruise ship during a vacation cruise.
Back in 1985, Mr. Africa was a child who survived an attack by the Philadelphia Police Department which dropped explosives on the row house of the…
The Department of State in the United States issued another warning about the high crime rate in Honduras, saying that "the level of crime and violence in Honduras remains critically high." You can read the June 24 2014 warning here.
The last warning from the U.S. state Department was issued on Christmas Eve, December…
This week Bermuda’s Royal Gazette newspaper has written about some of our articles about the island’s policy of prosecuting U.S. passengers who have a few grams of pot in their cabins on cruise ships which arrive at port.
Yesterday the Gazette published "Island’s Tough Line on Cruise Ship Passengers with Drugs is Criticised,"…
USA TODAY published an article today entitled "Baby on board: Best cruise ships for infants, toddlers."
Like most USA TODAY articles, it was mostly a "puff piece," trying hard to praise all of the cruise lines while writing nothing provocative or controversial.
The article picked four Disney cruise ships, three Royal Caribbean ships…
New air emission regulations will shortly affect the U.K. shipping industry. Toxic sulfur emissions must be reduced to 0.1 per cent, from a current high of around 4.5 per cent, by January 1, 2015.
The reason for the new regulations is that high sulfur fuel contributes substantially to emphysema, lung disease, congestive heart failure, birth…
Univision reports that a passenger has gone overboard from the MSC Divina cruise ship.
In an article entitled "cae al mar un mexicano que viajaba en crucero mundialista," the network says that a passenger fell 50 meters from deck 15 into the water.
The MSC cruise ship was sailing with around 3,500…
I returned from a two week vacation last week to find that our blog was picked as one of the top 20 cruise blogs by readers of USA TODAY.
The newspaper and "10 Best" are now asking the public to pick the best blog out of this group. At the end of the voting on…
The Latin America Monitor published an article about the high crime rate in the Bahamas entitled "Business Environment Analysis – Rising Murder Rate Poses Risk To Tourism Sector – JUNE 2014." the publication reports, in part:
". . . rising murder rates in the Bahamas, including some recent killings of foreign tourists, could…
