Carnival Splendor?
 

I assume by now most people have heard about the situation regarding the Carnival cruise ship "Splendor." It's been off the coast of Baja Mexico for the last two days after an engine room fire on the 8th killed most services, no lives lost just services. It's currently being towed back to the US port of San Diego and should arrive sometime tomorrow afternoon or early evening. Currently the passengers, who were expected a luxury cruise (Carnival?, not likely) are now eating Navy rations including Spam (you know Stuff Posing As Meat) which was delivered from a US aircraft carrier, the USS Ronald Reagan CVN 76. The cruise has stated every passenger will receive a full refund and free transport back to Long Beach, port of departure, plus a free future cruise should they wish to cruise again.

Think this is enough compensation? What about people who will be missing work days? I wonder what the maritime law is regarding law suits in cases such as this. All the reports I've read state the passengers "are in good spirits" but I'm betting once they get home the phone will start ringing from some help law firms. They may rethink just how good those spirits were.

Do you think you'd be upset by this or take it as "meh, stuff happens?" Myself I've been stuck on a ship at sea, dead in the water eating Navy rations. Of course those were all just drills (except one boiler room fire.) Not exactly the end of the world. I think I'd be happy with the refund and free future cruise. But I also don't think I'd ever have been on a Carnival cruise to begin with, one was enough for me. I like Holland America and Royal Caribbean myself.

Think people will sue? Would you?

Think this is fair compensation?

Do you "cruise?"

If so which lines do you prefer?

My first question was do they really only carry enough food to get in from port to port? I know having fresh things are nice, but am a little skeptical they don't carry more.

If I had a choice I'd say turn the ship into a cheaper open bar or comp drinks and you might find the money lost from alcohol could be cheaper than potential damages suits.

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first off, there is no beating fried spam.

secondly, these people are getting more than compensated. they get all the money they spent back AND they get a free cruise AND they're getting paid for the time they have off without having to spend it on expensive touristy stuff on the ship.

I think the problem is there is no way to cook or refrigerate the food. I know I read all they are eating is cold food.

Hopefully the drinks are free.

but you'd think they would have backup generators if the engine can't provide power

i've been on two major cruises - 10-day med cruise and 7-day carribbean cruise, both with holland america if i'm not mistaken. i enjoyed both immensely, and some of the side trips were fabulous (ask tully). i think i could survive a major setback such as this current fiasco, especially if they were offering cash back and another free cruise...

I have no idea about cruise ships but on my navy ship we had several back-up generators. The back up generator of last resorts was located forward (away from the engine room and boiler) and it only provided power to the bridge, Comms room and other "necessary services." Since they've been able to maintain comms with other ships my guess is they have some power but not enough to cook, A/C the cabins etc..

Again, just guessing here.

I'm guessing but there is probably a limitation of liability that is included with every cruise ticket purchased. What the cruise line is doing is most likely over and above whatever has been agreed to in the ticket because it will look good in the press.

Well if the fire was an accident...what can ya do? I suppose I'd be upset that my long awaited vacation was ruined but I'd probably get over it pretty quickly especially if they offered a full refund and what not.

In my experience actual accidents are rare. Poor planning and improper maintenance are not.

At least they didn't hit an iceberg...

It could be worse. However, they should have planned on what to do in case this sort of thing happened.

To me I do not think their compensation is enough. Some people plan whole vacations synchronizing family and friends to go on these trips. These few vacation days you will never get back you will not get the down time that your body needs. Bathrooms do not work now, there are no lights in rooms, 2 hour lines for food, elevators do not work, which is important for elderly to get around. People with special dietary needs have issues, this is a hell of a vacation.

For the people who work who may only get 10 days off a year or less, to have a week from hell, yes a refund and a new free trip is nice... some of them may never get over the trauma and be able to utilize it...

Umm, yes if they hit an ice berg off the western coast of Mexico we should all be worried.

From everything I've read they crew handled the (incident) fire "by the book." I guess is no people were actually involved in fighting this fire. A system such as inergen fire suppression system was either automatically deployed or activated from the bridge once power was cut to the affected space.

I would like to know what caused the electrical fire to begin with.

Never been on a cruise. Have been trying to talk the wife into going on one for years. I don't know if shes seen the news reports of this...

I would only sue if I got injured while on board as a direct result of the problem and they wouldn't cover the medical expenses.
A full refund plus transportation costs would work for me. Might not be the ideal vacation, but it would be memorable.

I don't doubt there will be lawsuits over this. Distress + large company = chumming the water.

Suing Carnival might not be that easy and you may have to travel to Florida to file such a suit. Someone sent me part of the clause written on every Carnival Cruise "passenger agreement."-

Maritime law is completely different then other forms of the legal system. I believe laws regarding air travel are also unique.

True, but that doesn't necessarily mean some lawyer in FL won't try a class action or some such. Most large corporations will just pay out instead of fighting it because its cheaper.

Completely irrelevant, but I thought it was funny..

I can see class action suits (there's an ironic term) but in my experience most class action suits leave lawyer with a whole lot more then the harmed parties. I'd eat my spam, take a free night in a nice hotel in San Diego and look to cash in on the future cruise.

I like the t-shirts. Story I read stated two ladies from Kansas flew in to sell them.

From the comments:

I'd buy that t-shirt.

Never been on a cruise, never wanted to although countless numbers of friends and relatives have told me how wonderful it is and that I should go. Not for me.

This sounds like the perfect plot for a zombie movie.

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Don't they Caribbean cruises where you can "rough it" (like sleeping bags in your cabin) and save a ton of money?

Thought I read something about that recently in a travel magazine. I'm kinda turned on by the idea. My kinda fun.

9 means a tactical Man vs Wild cruise.

You allz sleep in nice rooms if ya want, but me n him will set perimeter by the jacuzzi and rough it under the starlight for pennies on the dollar.

Spam? Sounds high class to me n Bear Grillis!!

Uh, nobody mentioned drinking their own urine, bro. Leave Bear "Testicle Chomper" Grylls outta this.

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And when I go on a cruise I'm going to set up a LPOP near the jacuzzi with the intent of being abducted by horny cougars.

/typical guido commentary with additional dirtbag bonus points awarded for cheesetacular use of military patrol acronyms

All this spam talk, and then waking up to this photojournalistic story, not even knowing what it was about, and now a day (or 3?) later, I finally learn about the relevant details from the TFP itself. I overlooked this being news (as I do with everything). I can't speak for anyone in reality, but situations which are not life-threatening, those where I'm one to consider the negative possibilities that can come with any activity involving life and its menial tasks, I'd say I'm not the type to get involved in superfluous legal affairs. This is the 'hypothetical me' on the cruise ship, issuing the statement. "It was an experience and a half."

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+ bonus: the picture I didn't really get, but now I understand to what it was referring to...

http://30.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lb...82gvo1_500.jpg
Members of the U.S. Navy prepare an emergency shipment of Spam bound for a
stranded cruise ship some 200 miles off the coast of San Diego.
(Photo by: Gregory Bull / AP via the San Francisco Chronicle)

Well, I rather be on a cruise ship with a blown engine than an airplane with a blown engine. And I'd totally take them up on the free cruise offer in the future; the odds are astronomical against a second failure.

Never been on a cruise, but I'd like to, and this incident certainly doesn't discourage me. The closest experience I've had to cruising is taking long-haul train trips, and there is an incident that reminds me of this.

When I was younger, my family took a train trip back East--we went by train from Portland to Seattle to Chicago to New York City to Washington, D.C. to Chicago to Portland. When we hit Chicago for the second time on our way home, we found that Chicago had been recently pummeled by the worst rains in recent history, and that flash floods had washed out the tracks our train was supposed to go on. So they packed us up and shipped us across the state to Galesburg, IL, where we caught a cobbled-together train about 8 or so hours after we'd been scheduled to depart Chicago. Our sleeping car was supposed to have been the staff sleeping car, so it wasn't as nice as the usual SuperLiner sleeper, and since they hadn't left from Chicago, the train didn't have all of the food it was supposed to have. Dinner that first night was KFC. Subsequent meals resembled bad airplane food. At the time, Amtrak usually had excellent food onboard; you could always count on a good steak being on the menu. The only good meal we had on that trip was the evening after we left Denver, because they'd been able to replenish some of the food. But then another disaster struck: halfway through Wyoming, the engineer ran out of his allotted hours and stopped the train; Amtrak had to drive a new engineer out to our stranded train. We went from being 8 or so hours late to being 14 hours late. We ran out of food again before we hit Boise the next evening, so dinner in Boise was KFC again. We finally rolled into Portland at 4am, and never were we so relieved to be off a train.

Originally Amtrak didn't offer us shit, but my dad raised hell and we got vouchers that paid for the family vacation the next summer.

If I were a passenger on the Splendor, I'd take the free cruise. A class action suit is likely to only yield $20.

...and a big fee for an attorney somewhere.

In yet another twist in this story-

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