Evidently, the problems never end for the Carnival Triumph, the Carnival cruise ship that has been involved in two headline-making ordeals so far this year. The most recent Carnival Triumph problem occurred yesterday, when high winds caused the ship to break away from a repair dock in Mobile, Alabama. A guard tent on the shipyard grounds and the two men within it were also blown into the waters of the Mobile River. One man was recovered and is being treated at a hospital, but the other man is still missing. The Carnival Triumph has been recovered and secured to the dock, with tugboats standing by as a precautionary measure. This most recent Carnival Triumph incident is not tied to the guard shack and the missing man, other than that both problems were caused by the same strong winds.
In truth, the situation that played out last night could have ended a lot worse. The Carnival Triumph, an enormous ship that can hold well over 4,000 people, was essentially drifting around uncontrollably in the river for several hours as 70-mph winds whipped past the ship. At one point, the Triumph ran into a docked ship belonging to the Army Corps of Engineers, but no one on that boat was hurt. None of the crew members on the Triumph during the ordeal were injured either, and, somewhat surprisingly, Carnival’s vessel remained largely undamaged, although it was scraped from the collision with the other moored ship. So, despite the fact that a huge cruise ship was adrift in a river that runs through a city and flows out into the vast Gulf of Mexico, everything is more or less fine now, other than the fact that a person is still missing at sea, which is obviously a tragic problem, but, again, it is not linked to the Carnival Triumph’s issues.
As stated above, this is the second ordeal the Carnival Triumph has been involved with this year. Just two months ago, in February, the ship was adrift at sea for four days after a fire in the engine room compromised the ship’s power. Passengers complained of terrible conditions on board – not much food was available according to some, and there were reports of toilets overflowing and waste spilling into cabins. The Triumph’s February problems were exactly why the ship was docked in Mobile, Alabama. This is where the ship returned to after the so-called “cruise from hell” finally ended – it has been undergoing repairs there ever since.
The Carnival Triumph was originally scheduled to start operating again on June 3rd, although this most recent incident may alter the repair schedule. Whenever the ship is repaired, the real question is whether anyone will want to take a cruise on it.