Our law firm has been contacted by several passengers who have slipped and injured themselves aboard the Carnival cruise ship Magic. The locations where the accidents occurred include the Lido deck, outside stair landings as well as the inside buffet areas. On the popular cruising forum Cruise Critic is a thread entitled Carnival Magic not so Magical wherein a passenger details her family’s experience encountering a slippery buffet area which lasted multiple days despite her repeated requests to make the area safe. Other passengers posted replies disclosing accidents they suffered or saw on the cruise ship. Is there a problem with the deck coating used on the Carnival Magic?
The Coast Guard reports a worker for Princess Cruise Lines has fallen off the Grand Princess cruise ship. The 34-year-old Filipino national was last seen Monday alive Monday night at 10:25 and is said to have gone overboard later that night or early Tuesday morning. The Coast Guard was notified and preformed a search along with the cruise ship and nearby cargo vessel. At this time, he has not been found. The cruise line claims the on board CCTV footage shows the crew member jumping off the ship. The Grand Princess was on a 15 day Hawaiian cruise leaving from San Francisco, California.
A Canadian passenger has fallen off the Holland America cruise ship Veendam last Friday. Reports state the 2,000 passenger Veendam was 300 miles off the San Diego, California coast when a woman was spotted going over the side. The rescue searchers ultimately located the passenger but it was too late. The Medical Examiner ruled the death as suicide. However, the ABC television news station in San Diego interviewed a witness who claims he observed the passenger on her balcony leaning over the rail to jump, but when she turned around to go back inside, she slipped and fell. The Holland American cruise ship was on a 7 day Mexican Rivera cruise. The name of the passenger has not been released. This is third incident in three weeks of a Canadian passenger falling off a cruise ship. The Maritime Law Blog has previously reported a 26-year-old man fell off the Royal Caribbean Adventure of the Seas on December 28th and a 65-year-old man fell off the Royal Caribbean Independence of the Seas on December 31st. If you have any information about these deaths, feel free to contact us or leave a comment.
Our cruise injury lawyers have been retained by several Carnival cruise ship passengers who were injured due to malfunctioning doors. These cases are spread throughout the fleet and involve cabin balcony, restroom as well as automatic sliding doors. A cruise line such as Carnival has a legal duty to every passenger to exercise what is known reasonably care under the circumstances. This means the cruise line does not have to provide an accident free ship but must take reasonable precautions to protect passengers from danger. Concerning doors, reasonable precautions would include performing routine maintenance, periodic inspections and, if the door was observed malfunctioning, erecting a barrier until that door is fixed. It is our experience that such precautions are often overlooked and fixes are slow aboard cruise ships. This is why accidents are so prevalent.
Just 5 days after Canadian passenger Tien Phuoc Nguyen reportedly fell off the Adventure of the Seas, there are news reports of a second Canadian tourist has fallen off a Royal Caribbean Cruise ship.