A handful of recent stories have shed light unwanted light on the image-conscious cruise industry.  Cruise lines like Carnival and Royal Caribbean spend hundreds of millions of dollars a year to paint pictures of care free vacations.  But here are some stories published in the last few days which make you realize that the fun-filled family cruise may a bit different than

Local ABC affiliate WTVD News11 Raleigh / Durham, North Carolina aired a story yesterday about a number of families who traveled to Miami only to find that they could not use their birth certificates to board the cruise ship.

It turns out that Royal Caribbean recognizes only certain types of birth certificates as proper identification. 

Some passengers arrived in

The U.K.’s Mail Online reports that cruise passengers on the P&O Cruises cruise ship Artemis in the Mediterranean are "in revolt" after engine problems caused them to miss out on several ports (Valencia, Naples and Gibraltar) during the 20 day cruise. 

Artemis Cruise ShipThe newspaper writes that "angry holidaymakers have now set up a committee to represent the 1,200 passengers

An article in the Baltimore Sun entitled "Pleasure Cruise Bring Risks, Too" addresses the limited liability of cruise lines when tragedy strikes a family during a cruise.  Written by Frank Roylance, the article begins with the sad circumstances of Carnival cruise passenger Carol Olson who died during what appears to be a very lax, unsupervised and negligently

Preparation for a trial delayed our "Top 10 Reasons Not To Cruise."  But here we go again with the reasons why you should think twice before spending your hard earned vacation dollars on a family cruise. Here’s reason no. 8: 

BLACKWATER!

That nasty raw sewage which cruise lines can freely dump – completely untreated – just twelve miles from shore.  Yes

The Baltimore Sun reports on the death of a 71 year old passenger from Reisterstown, Maryland , Carol Olson, during a snorkeling excursion in the Bahamas.  Ms. Olson was a passenger on Carnival’s Pride cruise ship and booked the excursion from the cruise line. 

Other passengers described having problems with the current. The excursion was described as poorly managed with

From time to time, I’ll include a “personal story” in Cruise Law News, like this one.

This year my younger son, John, a 7th grader tried out for the 7th and 8th grade lacrosse teams at his school Gulliver Academy.  He had never played lacrosse before.  Quite frankly, I don ‘t think he had ever

Obtaining accurate information from the cruise industry is difficult.  Whenever passengers have a complaint, the cruise lines either ignore them or the cruise lines’ customer relations departments send them a nonsensical letter several weeks later dismissing their complaints or offering a 25% on a future cruise.  This often infuriates the passengers who have no intention of ever sailing on a

The Galveston County Daily News reports today that the medical examiner concluded that Carnival cruise passenger Kipi Holcomb died of a drug overdose. 

As we mentioned in prior articles, on February 15, 2010 Ms. Holcomb was found in her cabin aboard Carnival’s Ecstasy cruise ship after sailing from port in Galveston.

The FBI previously indicated that there was no evidence of foul play.  The medical examiner also found no

The Juneau Empire reports that Alaska just weakened its wastewater regulations at the cruise industry’s request.  Cruise ships are now permitted to dump greater amount of ammonia (from fecal matter), copper, nickel and zinc in Alaska’s pristine waters.

The newspaper reports that the cruise industry is "pleased" and  and "appreciates" the new wastewater discharge rules.

The cruise

Cruise Critic ran an article a couple of weeks ago about the Top 10 Reasons To Cruise.  I responded with my article "Top Ten Reasons Not To Cruise."  I previously addressed the first six  reasons not to cruise, which are at the bottom of this article.*

The purpose of this series is not to convince you not to cruise, but to educate consumers