cruise ship triumph disaster

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Carnival Triumph disaster: A drama of discomfort

On Friday morning we finally saw them, those wretched refugees of the Carnival Triumph, after five days stranded at sea. They disembarked the floating Port-a-John on which they had been imprisoned, some wearing white cruise line bathrobes to protect themselves against the unexpected chill, kneeling to kiss the ground as they came ashore.

“United States,” a woman in a floppy hat breathed ecstatically to a television reporter. “Ain’t nothing better.”

A cruise represents not only a vacation, but a very specific kind of vacation. One books it when one does not want to have to decide, or plan, or worry, or change money, or get tetanus shots. The people who would take a cruise have considered hiking through Nepal, cycling through Norway, staying at quaint little flophouses in Eastern Europe — it's not like they don't know those travel options exist — and thought, "No." They do not believe that getting your wallet stolen in Mexico City is "a good story."

I have cruised, and I loved it, and so I say fondly: A cruise ship’s passenger log is comprised entirely of the exact demographic that is least prepared for a cruise to go to pot. A cruise is a giant boat full of your mother-in-law. Your mother-in-law does not belong in the wild.

What happened: Midway through a four-day Mexican cruise, the Triumph's engine room caught fire, the ship lost power, and then suddenly it was just drifting, somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico. A four-day trip became an eight-day one. A 102,000-ton boat , the length of three football fields and containing 4,000 passengers, was reduced to Huck Finn's raft. It took three days for some gallant little tugboats to tow it into port in Mobile, Ala. There was nothing for watchers at home to do but imagine the hellscape aboard the doomed vessel.

But now the survivors are back, ready to share what really happened. On the "Today" show, Matt Lauer encouraged two female passengers to tell him everything . But everything, edited. "Not too graphic," he warned them. This was, after all, a morning show. The women appeared briefly flummoxed, trying to figure out how to tell a G-rated version of the story.

“It was, like, post-natural disaster,” Julie Billings said finally. “But stuck on a boat.”

Excuse us, Matt Lauer, but how could the story not be graphic? The filth, the waste, the rapid decline, is precisely what made the saga so horrifying for viewers and readers at home. We hung onto every bleated-out text message of despair, every description of what they were eating, and where they were sleeping, and where their waste went. (In red plastic bags. Marked with hazardous-waste symbols. Left outside state rooms. In ice buckets. We saw pictures.)

It was a drama, but not of danger. It was a drama of discomfort.

The smell. Just think of the smell. Skip this paragraph if you don't want to think of the smell. The unrefrigerated food and the unrefreshed bodies, the uncirculated dankness of the cabins, so filthy that passengers began sleeping on deck chairs instead, lugging their pillows to some high-thread-count open-air slumber party.

“I’m just happy to be alive,” a woman told “Good Morning America.”

Hell is other people. Hell is other people on a boat. What will it take before we accept this? After David Foster Wallace writes about it in an erudite essay ? After a Concordia captain abandons his sinking ship? After a New York Times reporter mentions that his journey on the classy Cunard was delayed for several hours so workers could scrub the ship down after a norovirus outbreak?

It’s over now, all over.

Carnival put the passengers on buses, heading either to New Orleans or to their origin point of Galveston, Tex. The company had promised to cover all travel expenses home. And to give each passenger $500 in compensation.

As well as a credit. A credit for another cruise.

A Photo History Of Carnival Cruise Ship Disasters

In mid-February, an engine room fire onboard the Carnival Cruises ship Triumph left more than 4,000 passengers stranded in the Gulf of Mexico, with no hot water and few working toilets.

A month later, just as the incident was fading from the public eye, the diesel generator in the Carnival Dream malfunctioned, while the ship was at port, and passengers were flown home.

The next week, Carnival Legend had a technical issue with its sailing speed, and was sent back to its destination in Tampa, canceling a scheduled stop.

This recent string of public relations disasters is not a new phenomenon for Carnival: Its first ship ran aground on a sandbar on its inaugural voyage. There have been fires on four ships since 1998.

The Costa Concordia, operated by a Carnival subsidiary, struck a reef of the coast of Italy in January 2012, killing 32 people.

But despite its checkered past, the increased cost of maintaining its aging fleet, and the need to cut prices to draw customers put off by recent fires and strandings, Carnival's bottom line has not badly suffered.

In fact, its quarterly earnings and revenue just beat market expectations, and Carnival executives say bookings have already bounced back in the wake of the heavily publicized Triumph disaster.

Problems started early for Carnival: The TSS Mardi Gras, its first cruise ship, ran aground on a sandbar during its inaugural voyage, in 1972.

Everything was fine until July 1998, when a fire started in the main laundry room of the Ecstasy, soon after the ship left Miami.

A fleet of tugboats fought the fire and pulled the ship to shore, but not before 8 passengers and 14 crew members were injured.

Repairs cost $17 million.

[Source: NTSB ]

A little more than a year later, a fire started in the engine room of the Tropicale (later renamed Ocean Dream). The ship was left stranded in the path of Tropical Storm Harvey, but no one was injured.

In November 2010, the Carnival Splendor lost power after an engine room fire, and was towed to shore by tugboats.

The aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan brought supplies, including Spam and Pop-Tarts, when food supplies on board ran low.

[Source: CNN ]

The ship finally reached shore three days after the fire.

After spending three days without air conditioning and hot water, passengers finally escaped the ship.

Carnival's most serious problem came in January 2012. The Costa Concordia, operated by a Carnival subsidiary, ran aground off the coast of Italy and partially sunk.

32 people died.

In a show of sympathy, the flags at the Carnival headquarters in Doral, Florida were flown at half-mast.

Last month, Italian prosecutors officially sought to indict Captain Francesco Schettino on manslaughter charges.

[Source: The Guardian ]

The wrecked Costa Concordia is still sitting half-submerged in Italy. An incredibly complex, $400 million operation to remove it should be complete by next summer.

In February 2013, an engine room fire led to a power loss on the Carnival Triumph, stranding the ship in the Gulf of Mexico.

It took five days to tow the enormous vessel back to port, and its passengers were stuck on a ship with few working toilets and no power.

Some of the 4,229 passengers have filed a class-action lawsuit against Carnival, but because they signed waivers, they likely won't win.

In March, the problems continued for Carnival: The diesel generator in the Dream malfunctioned while the ship was at port in St Maarten.

Passengers were flown home, and will receive a refund equal to the equivalent of three days of the trip, plus half-off on a future cruise.

Just a week later, the Carnival Legend had a technical issue with its sailing speed, and was sent back to its destination in Tampa, canceling a scheduled stop. Passengers received a $100 credit.

The recent string of incidents has hurt Carnival's bottom line, but not seriously: Its quarterly earnings and revenue beat market expectations.

Now see how another company has faced disaster.

DON'T MISS: How America's Coolest Automaker Crashed So Hard, So Fast >

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Carnival Triumph cruise ship crisis ‘a tale of two ships’

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MOBILE, Ala. — As conditions deteriorated on the crippled Carnival cruise ship Triumph, some passengers panicked. They hoarded food, drank too much and argued.

But other passengers on the ship lumbering through the Gulf of Mexico banded together. They shared water, prayed together, comforted the children of strangers, and greeted each other in the halls like old friends.

“What you had was a tale of two ships,” said the Rev. Wendell Gill of First Baptist Church in La Porte, Texas.

The Triumph’s five-day odyssey of misery ended late Thursday night when the ship docked here, guided to port by four tugboats. As the 3,141 passengers on the ill-fated Mexican cruise made their way home Friday, they described a desperate atmosphere that brought out the best and worst in people.

“People were hoarding food — boxes and boxes of cereal, grabbing cake with both hands,” said Debbie Moyes, 32, of Phoenix.

Photos: Stranded Carnival cruise ship Triumph

After a fire disabled the ship’s power system Sunday, the crew of 1,086 offered an open bar, Moyes said. But that was canceled after some passengers drank too much and began cursing and fighting. Passengers said one woman, a newlywed, got into a spat and threatened to leap off the ship (she didn’t).

As the ship drifted, sanitation worsened, Moyes said. Freezers stopped working, food spoiled.

Toilets failed and passengers were forced to urinate in sinks. Later, the crew directed them to use red plastic biohazard bags, which stacked up outside staterooms. Moyes saw sewage dripping down walls. Sometimes people slipped on it, she said.

“It was like a hot Porta Potti,” Moyes said. And when the ship tilted, “it would spill.”

Amid all the unpleasantness were acts of kindness.

When Gill and others noticed no one from Carnival seemed to be helping the elderly and sick get around, they filled in, carting mattresses and bedding up from the lower decks. Others took care of each other, sharing Tylenol with those with sick children.

A group of men celebrating a buddy’s bachelor party, all Class of 2000 graduates of Winston Churchill High School in San Antonio, ran into a bachelorette party — Winston Churchill Class of 2006 — with nowhere to sleep. The men, like many others, erected makeshift tents on deck.

“We built them a shantytown,” said Chris Atherton, 30.

Gill and his wife, Cindey, had been billeted on the first level, but left after “sewage came up through the shower drain, pooling in the sink and squishing in the carpet,” she said.

He tried to combat the rumors that ran amok on board — that someone died, broke a leg, contracted measles or was quarantined. But like many, Wendell Gill wanted more information from Carnival.

He was discouraged to see people getting drunk and disorderly the night of the open bar — and Gill’s no teetotaler. He had a beer that night, too. He later gathered a prayer group of people worried about getting sick, about kids and jobs back home. By Wednesday, they had attracted 200 people, some of whom helped fellow passengers gather bedding and deck chairs.

“In an adverse situation, most people will rise to help — that’s just the human spirit,” he said. “It was the people on the boat that saved Carnival.”

Atherton said it seemed that Carnival had no emergency plans in place to aid passengers once they were stranded, that the crew seemed to be improvising — handling things well, but on the fly.

The ship’s band played on, staging a special Mardi Gras performance complete with beads on Tuesday, passengers said. The last day on board, the crew opened a grill — thanks to a backup generator brought by another ship — and served lobster. There was cheesecake for dessert.

Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), chairman of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, fired off a letter Friday asking the Coast Guard command to brief his panel on its investigation into the Triumph. “Horrified” was how Rockefeller described his reaction to the accounts of “unbearable living conditions aboard the ship.”

A lawsuit was also filed Friday by Cassie Terry, 25, of Lake Jackson, Texas. She is suing Carnival for breach of maritime contract, negligence and fraud as a result of the “unseaworthy, unsafe, unsanitary, and generally despicable conditions” on the ship.

One of her attorneys, Brent Allison of Pearland, Texas, said he had received calls from other passengers. “They are concerned about their health — what they inhaled, what they may have eaten,” he said.

Despite the public relations nightmare, travel experts and others say the financial impact for Carnival will probably be short-lived. The company offered passengers a refund, cruise credit and $500.

“They have basically a good product,” said Andrew Coggins Jr., a professor of management at Pace University’s Lubin School of Business in New York and retired Navy commander who teaches a class on cruise management.

In 2010, passengers on the Carnival Splendor were stranded at sea for four days after an engine fire left the ship adrift off the coast of San Diego. Yet later that year, Carnival’s parent company reported an 11% increase in net income.

Some passengers said they were willing to cruise again.

“You fall off a bicycle, you don’t never ride again?” said Mike Westwood, a retired Air Force officer from San Antonio who was on the Triumph with his wife.

[email protected]

Staff writer Hugo Martin in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

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Did the Carnival Cruise Ship 'Triumph' Overturn and Sink?

"jokes are created by users." but not necessarily good jokes., published nov. 7, 2018.

About this rating

On 7 November 2018, a brief article published on the "prank" web site React365 reported that the Carnival cruise ship Triumph had overturned and sunk off the coast of Mexico:

The Carnival cruise ship Triumph ran aground and overturned after striking an underwater rock off the coast of Mexico while coming into port the evening of November 5th 2018 resulting in 32 deaths. There may have been additional people not listed as on board, so the death toll could possibly be higher. The search for bodies was canceled after a small tropical storm came in and resumed the morning of the 6th. Scuba teams are still recovering bodies, stay connected for any new information pertaining to this devastating accident.

This was not a genuine news report, and the included picture did not show the Carnival cruise ship Triumph sinking off the coast of Mexico in November 2018.

This photograph depicts the Costa Concordia , a luxury cruise ship that ran aground off the coast of Tuscany, Italy, in January 2012. The disaster resulted in the deaths of 32 people:

On January 13, 2012 the Italian cruise ship, which was carrying 4,200 people, collided with rocks just off the coast of the Mediterranean island, Giglio. The impact tore a 230-foot gash into the ship's hull, eventually making it capsize. Thirty-two people died in the disaster, while the others were successfully evacuated. On February 11, 2015, the ship's captain, Francesco Schettino, was sentenced to a prison term of 16 years and one month for, among other things, negligent homicide.

Carnival's website for their Triumph cruise ship does not show anything out of the ordinary. It lists no reports about an alleged sinking, and potential customers can still book trips on the cruise ship.

React 365 is a "prank" web site that provides users with a template to create their own fake news stories in order to trick their friends on social media. A disclaimer at the bottom of the site reads: "This website is an entertainment website, jokes are created by users. These are humorous jokes, fantasy, fictional, that should not be seriously taken or as a source of information."

Boesalager, Matern.   "Ship to Wreck: Grim, Beautiful Photos of the Costa Concordia."     Vice .   29 January 2016.

Fox News .   "Court Hears How 32 Died in Costa Concordia Shipwreck."     17 July 2013.

By Dan Evon

Dan Evon is a former writer for Snopes.

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Carnival Triumph incident

Kendall Jenkins, left, of Houston, celebrates with Brittany Ferguson, of Houston, after getting off the Carnival Triumph in Mobile, Ala., on Feb. 14, 2013. The ship with more than 4,200 passengers and crew members has been idled for nearly a week in the Gulf of Mexico following an engine room fire.

The crippled cruise liner Carnival Triumph limps into port guided by tug boats on Feb. 14, in Mobile, Ala.

A young passenger waits to board a bus after disembarking from the crippled Carnival Triumph cruse ship after it was towed to port in Mobile, Ala., on Feb. 14.

Passengers from the cruise ship Carnival Triumph are questioned by reporters after they disembarked in Mobile, Ala., on Feb. 14.

People watch from their balconies aboard the Carnival Triumph after it was towed to the cruise terminal in Mobile, Ala., on Feb. 14.

Kendall Jenkins kisses the ground after stepping off the Carnival ship Triumph at the Alabama Cruise terminal in Mobile, Ala., on Feb, 14.

Carnival Cruise Lines CEO Gerry Cahill stands alone on the deck of the Carnival Triumph in Mobile, Ala., on Feb. 14.

Veronica Arriaga, of Angleton, Texas, a passenger from the disabled Carnival Triumph cruise ship, holds a sign referring to the red biohazard bags used as toilets, after arriving by bus at the Hilton Riverside Hotel in New Orleans, on Feb. 15.

Passengers of the Carnival Triumph walk to their buses after docking at the cruise terminal in Mobile, Ala., on Feb. 14. The passengers will be bused to New Orleans for the night.

Maria Hernandez, of Angleton, Texas, a passenger from the disabled Carnival Triumph cruise ship, tears up as she describes the ordeal to reporters after arriving by bus at the Hilton Riverside Hotel in New Orleans, on Feb. 15.

Passengers aboard the Carnival Triumph walk along the deck before leaving the ship in Mobile, Ala., on Feb. 14.

Passengers wait to leave the Carnival Triumph cruise ship after reaching the port of Mobile, Ala., on Feb. 14.

People watch from their balconies and hold up signs aboard the Carnival Triumph after it was towed to the cruise terminal in Mobile, Ala., on Feb. 14.

The cruise ship Carnival Triumph is pushed towards the cruise terminal along the Mobile River in Mobile, Ala., on Feb. 14.

The cruise ship Carnival Triumph is towed up the Mobile River in Mobile, Ala., on Feb. 14.

The Carnival Triumph cruise ship is towed towards the port of Mobile, Alabama, Feb. 14, 2013. The 893-foot vessel has been without propulsion and running on emergency generator power since Sunday, when an engine room fire left it adrift in the Gulf of Mexico.

The Carnival Triumph is towed into Mobile Bay near Dauphin Island, Ala., Thursday. The ship with more than 4,200 passengers and crew members has been idled for nearly a week in the Gulf of Mexico.

People watch the cruise ship being towed towards Mobile Bay near Dauphin Island, Ala., Thursday, Feb. 14.

Terry Thornton, Senior VP of Marketing at Carnival Cruise Lines, speaks at a press conference, Feb. 14, in Mobile, Ala.

A Coast Guard MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter delivers approximately 3,000 pounds of equipment, which included a generator and electrical cables, from the offshore supply vessel Lana Rose to the Carnival Cruise Ship Triumph in the Gulf of Mexico, on February 13. The generator is used to help provide additional power to the cruise ship. Passengers on the stricken cruise ship in the Gulf of Mexico are enduring a nightmare after days without power, waiting hours for sparse meals and relieving themselves in plastic bags.

People wave an SOS sign at the side of their balconies on the Carnival Triumph cruise ship on Thursday, Feb. 14.

Rusty and Beth Adkins of Noblesville, Ind., await the arrival of their 18-year-old daughter Brianna aboard the disabled Carnival Triumph in Mobile, Ala., on Thursday, Feb. 14. The teenager went on a cruise with four aunts and cousins. Rusty Adkins is holding his 1-year-old son Brocktyn Adkins.

The tugboats Resolve Pioneer and Dabhol, left, tow and steer the Carnival Triumph cruise ship in the Gulf of Mexico. The ship is enroute to Mobile, Ala., after an engine room fire on Sunday, Feb. 10 left the ship powerless.

Gerry Cahill, left, president and CEO of Carnival Cruise Lines, walks to a podium to address the media during a news conference regarding the cruise ship Carnival Triumph, February 12, at the company's headquarters in Miami.

The Coast Guard Cutter Vigorous patrols near the Carnival Triumph in the Gulf of Mexico on Feb. 11. The Carnival Triumph had been floating aimlessly about 150 miles off the Yucatan Peninsula since a fire erupted in the aft engine room early Sunday, knocking out the ship's propulsion system. No one was injured and the fire was extinguished.

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The 9 Worst Cruise Ship Disasters

The Titanic may be the most famous ship disaster, but surprisingly, it’s not even close to being the deadliest wreck that ever occurred on a luxury liner. If you’re trying to dissuade someone from taking a cruise, you should show them this list of maritime misadventures presented in no particular order. Disclaimer: The vast majority of cruises sail without incident and are safe and not filled with poop. (Oh yeah, we’ll get there.) Get your plate ready for a buffet of high-seas horror.

1. RMS Titanic

F.G.O. Stuart (1843-1923) {{PD-old}} /Wikimedia Commons

The many experts in 1912 who considered the Titanic “unsinkable” were to be proven wrong on the boat’s maiden voyage from Southampton to New York City. Thomas Andrews had designed the ship to withstand head-on collisions and rammings from other ships. However, the North Atlantic Ocean iceberg that took down the vessel scraped through five of its 16 watertight compartments. The boat would have reportedly remained afloat if it had only gone through four. Like other systems at the time, the Titanic's lifeboats were designed to shepherd passengers to nearby rescue ships, not take them to shore. Unfortunately, help was many hours away in the wee hours of April 15 when the boat was going under. The poor crew organization also caused many lifeboats to leave the ship at far less than full capacity. Plus, they only had enough boats for about a third of the onboard. As a result, more than 1,500 people died — either on the ship or in the icy waters, waiting for help. A recent theory suggests a fire that started in the hull before the ship set sail weakened the vessel’s steel walls, making it susceptible to an iceberg that normally wouldn’t have caused as much damage.

2. Eastern Star’s Dongfang zhi Xing

In 2015, Dongfang zhi Xing was traveling on the Yangtze River in China when a thunderstorm struck, and the boat capsized. Ships in the area were warned that bad storms were coming and told to take precautions, but it is unclear if the Dongfang zhi Xing ever received the warnings and continued to sail. The ship was met with winds of up to 72-85 mph, and ultimately, a downburst (a strong downward wind) caused the ship to capsize and sink. Out of the 454 people on board, only 12 survived, making the total number of dead 442.

3. Carnival Cruise Line’s Triumph

DVIDSHUB/Flickr

A generator fire on Carnival Cruise Lines’s Triumph (now called Carnival Sunrise) left the ship powerless, and a late-night comedy punchline was born: “The Poop Cruise.” Without working bathrooms, passengers were forced to drop their payloads into red “hazardous waste” bags and stuff them into garbage cans left in the hall. Passengers described carpets soaked with more than two inches of raw sewage. News reports described the scene as a “shanty town” and a “new circle of hell.” One passenger reportedly called her husband and told him that their 12-year-old daughter had Skittles for breakfast. It took four days for the Triumph to be towed from the Gulf of Mexico to Mobile, Alabama, where it was possible to smell the ship from the dock. Later, 31 passengers claimed long-lasting damage, including PTSD, and sued. After the verdict, 27 of them split $118,000, many earning less than $3,000 (minus legal fees) for their troubles.

4. Costa Concordia

European Commission DG ECHO/Flickr

One of the biggest passenger ships ever wrecked, the Costa Concordia had 17 decks, six restaurants, a three-story theater, and enough room for 4,200 vacationers. On January 13, 2012, Captain Francesco Schettino agreed to a request by the ship’s chief maître d’, Antonello Tievoli, and sailed closer to Isola del Giglio than normal. Why? Tievoli, a native of Giglio, wanted to impress and “salute” local residents. Unfortunately, Captain Schettino turned off the ship’s alarm for the computer navigation system and later admitted he thought he knew the waters well enough to navigate by sight. However, the ship’s first mate testified that the captain had left his glasses in his cabin and requested them. The Costa Concordia struck an underwater rock, capsized, and sank, killing 32 passengers. Schettino’s worst maritime sin? He abandoned the ship with 300 passengers still onboard. A Coast Guard officer in contact with the ship at the time of the sinking claimed he told Schettino to get back onboard. After being convicted of manslaughter and pursuing several appeals, Schettino only started his 16-year prison sentence in May of 2017. The salvage effort (the ship was completely dismantled) was the largest effort of its kind.

5. SS Eastland

Launched in 1903, the SS Eastland was a passenger ship based in Chicago and used for tours. Although the ship had noted listing (tilting) since its inception and some measures had been taken to rectify this, the SS Eastland was still suffering from being top-heavy when boarding for a cruise in 1915. The ship was meant to sail from Chicago to Michigan City, Indiana, carrying workers from Western Electric Company’s Hawthorne Works for a picnic. On July 24, 2,572 passengers boarded, with many congregating on the open upper decks. While still docked, the ship began to list to the port side, and reportedly, at some point, more passengers rushed to the port side, causing the ship to roll onto its side completely. Despite the river’s bottom being just 20 feet below and the shore being about the same distance, a total of 844 passengers and crew members died, including 22 entire families.

6. Royal Pacific

When the Royal Pacific was first launched as a passenger ferry in 1964, it could carry 250 passengers, 91 cars, and 16 trucks. Sold and converted into a cruise ship in the late 1980s, the boat’s maiden voyage was a two-night “cruise to nowhere” from Singapore and sailed by Phuket, Malacca, and Penang before returning home. At around 2 a.m., when most passengers were asleep, the crew heard a loud bang, and the plates on the buffet table crashed to the ground. A Taiwanese trawler, Terfu 51, had accidentally rammed the ship, leaving a six-foot gash in the side. As the trawler pulled away, there was a deafening sound of metal scraping against metal. The PA system wasn’t working properly on the boat, but the safety officer ran downstairs to survey the damage. When he returned, he told everyone to put on their life jackets. Reports vary about how many passengers were impacted — most tallies number 30 dead and 70 injured. Several passengers also complained that a mix of Greek-, English- and Mandarin-speaking crew members led to few people understanding what anyone was saying.

7. SS Morro Castle

The story of the SS Morro Castle is so dreadful it’s surprising no Hollywood producer has turned the tale into a horror movie. Director Fritz Lang collaborated on a script about the tragedy, and named it “Hell Afloat” (which is a pretty apt description), but it was never made. Between 1930 and 1934, the SS Morro Castle regularly shuttled 480-plus passengers between Havana and New York. While onboard, there was no Depression to worry about and no Prohibition, which meant plenty of booze-filled partying. However, the September 1934 return sail from Cuba to the Big Apple seemed cursed. On September 7, Captain Robert Wilmott complained of stomach trouble after eating dinner and retired to his cabin, where he later died of an apparent heart attack. Chief Officer William Warms took command, and a few hours later, around 3 a.m. on September 8, a fire started in one of the storage lockers. The crew’s attempts to fight the fire were haphazard and inadequate, and soon, the blaze couldn’t be contained. Many crew members abandoned the ship, leaving confused passengers to fend for themselves in the dark, smoky hallways. Some jumped from the deck to their death in the water. Rescuers lined up on the Jersey Shore to meet the lifeboats carrying passengers. The next morning, the burning, black hull of the SS Morro Castle ran aground at Asbury Park, New Jersey. Of the 549 people aboard the cruise, 86 guests and 49 crew members died.

8. Royal Caribbean’s Explorer of the Seas

A cruise can be an oasis of calm in rough waters, but it’s also a petri dish of disease where viruses ricochet from passenger to passenger. In 2014, the Royal Caribbean’s Explorer of the Seas cruise from New Jersey to the Caribbean earned the dubious honor of being the ship with more sick passengers than any other boat trip since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention started keeping statistics more than 20 years ago. An estimated 700 passengers and crew members were sick at some point. Most cruise ship illnesses result from norovirus, that causes inflammation of the stomach and large intestines and regular trips to the “head.” If you’re wondering how to stay healthy on a cruise with sick passengers, plenty of handwashing (and avoiding ill people) is key. Bugs pass quickly through contact with ship railings, bathroom doors, and buffet food.

9. MTS Oceanos

Built by a French company and first launched in 1952, the MTS Oceanos was purchased by a Greek company in 1976. On August 3, 1991, Oceanos set sail for East London, South Africa, and headed north for Durban, led by Captain Yiannis Avranas. The ship reportedly headed into 40-knot winds and 30-foot swells, and thus, the typical sail-away outdoor deck party with British entertainers Moss and Tracy Hills was moved to an indoor lounge. The sea conditions worsened that night, leading to the ship rolling from side to side, and eventually, an explosion was heard due to a lack of repairs for the waste disposal system. This all led to the ship losing power and water filling its generator room, so the generators were shut down and the ship was led adrift. A distress call was sent and answered by numerous South African helicopters and a Dutch container ship. Shockingly, the captain and many crew members were among the first to be airlifted to shore, leaving the entertainment staff to coordinate the rescue efforts and help passengers to safety. All 571 passengers and crew members were saved by the time the ship sank nose-first into the sea.

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Carnival's Crippled Ship Expected To Hurt Cruise Business

This week's debacle on the Carnival Triumph is a setback that may cost the company as much as $80 million and hurt the industry's image. Carnival says passengers who were on the Triumph the last five days without power were miserable, but at least they were safe. Industry watchers say Carnival generally has handled the mishap well, but that the industry may need to rethink how it deal with events like power outages on floating cities than can carry more than 5,000 people.

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Watch CBS News

After recent cruise disasters, Carnival tries to right the ship

September 6, 2013 / 2:25 PM EDT / CBS News

(CBS News) It's been a rocky ride for Carnival Cruise Lines after several high-profile mishaps in recent years. Now the company is spending more than half-a-billion dollars for improvements to right the ship.

Arnold Donald, the new chief executive officer of Carnival -- on the job for less than nine weeks -- recently sat down with CBS News travel editor Peter Greenberg to discuss the company's recent issues and improvements in the works at the largest cruise line in the world.

Last year, Costa Concordia -- a Carnival-owned ship -- ran aground off the coast of Italy, killing 32 people on board. Speaking of that event, Donald said, "It was not any infrastructure or systemic problem that produced the Concordia. It was a one-off unbelievable error in judgment, and it was a tragedy."

"60 Minutes": Costa Concordia: Salvaging a shipwreck

Then, this past February, an engine room fire left the Carnival Triumph powerless and adrift for days in the Gulf of Mexico without air conditioning or working toilets. It was a public relations disaster for Carnival.

Greenberg asked Donald, "How do you get ahead of that story?"

"Obviously we didn't," Donald said. "In the future, the way to get ahead of it is to not have it happen."

Donald took over as chief executive officer of Carnival after bookings fell, shares plummeted, and some passengers sued.

Greenberg said, "The good news with the Triumph is you got the fire out and nobody died."

Donald replied, "Not only did no one die, no one was hurt, no one was sick, so there was no safety health issue involved with the Triumph at all."

But it forced Carnival to take a hard look at the design of its ships and safety systems. As a result, the company is spending upwards of $600 million to upgrade its fleet.

Donald said, "In the highly unlikely event we should ever lose power again we'd be able to have a system to back that up and we'd have a process to keep from losing power in the first place."

Carnival Cruise Lines' new vice president of technical operations Mark Jackson -- a former Coast Guard commander -- came on board in April to turn things around. Jackson said, "What happened on Triumph is horrible for our guests and we never want that to happen again, but unfortunately it's something that we learned the hard way."

The first order of business -- rerouting 63 miles of cable, so that a fire would be less likely to take out both engine rooms, as it did on the Triumph. Jackson said, "If one room is lost, we don't lose the other."

Then it was fire suppression -- increasing the number of water mist nozzles from roughly 30 to about 500, and adding a 24/7 manned patrol to look for oil or fuel leaks. And finally, installing a second backup generator, nowhere near the engine room -- just in case. That way, basic services would stay up and running, which, for a ship that size, is no small task.

Despite the bad PR, the statistics are still overwhelmingly in passengers' favor. Donald said, "Keep in mind, these incidents represent far less than one percent of the experience with all our guests."

Still, as consumer confidence tumbled the line began offering deep discounts to get people on board, in some cases slashing fares to just $149 per cruise.

But cruise ship economics are unforgiving, it's not what the passengers pay to book their cruise that counts, it's what they spend once they're on board that moves the bottom line.

The bottom line for Donald now is to reposition Carnival, rebuild its reputation, and fill his ships.

Watch Greenberg's full report above. -->

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