Carnival Splendor makes it back to shore, as passengers tell of holiday from hell

By Daily Mail Reporter

Coming home: Family, friends and media crews watch as the stricken cruise liner Carnival Splendor finally reached shore at San Diego Harbor this morning after drifting at sea for the past four days


It was an expensive cruise holiday that quickly turned into a hell on the high seas. Passengers disembarking from stricken cruise liner Carnival Splendor, which finally made it to San Diego after four days at sea, breathed a sigh of relief to be back on dry land.

But some of the 3,299 passengers left adrift in the Pacific after Monday's engine fire have already began to make their anger known.

The passengers were left without hot water or hot food and toilets that didn't work for the past few days.

The 952-foot ship reached the California shore this morning, pulled in by six tugs and escorted by U.S. Coast Guard Cutters.


Happy: The 3,299 passengers on board the ship wave and look happy to finally see dry land after their ordeal which some have described as a 'nightmare' journey


The ship was greeted by by cheers from family members and friends of the passengers on board the cruise liner.

But the celebrations were short lived for Greg Parish, 48, who said it was his first and last cruise.

'It was putrid like a pit toilet', he said. ' This is a vacation from hell... I think I'm pretty done with this cruise business'.

'We woke up at 6am to the smell of smoke. I opened the hallway door and it was filled with smoke', Mr Parish said about Monday's fire, echoing other passenger accounts that they were only told there was smoke, not a full-blown engine fire.

He added: 'I felt like they were kind of leading us on and lying to us. They weren't telling us what was really happening. The whole area was filled with smoke and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see what is going on'.

41-year-old Maria Azila was enjoying her fifth cruise to celebrate her mother's 75th birthday when it all went disastrously wrong.

'It was awful, it was sewage', Ms Azila said describing the smell on the ship. 'The food was bad', she added.


Relieved: The passengers watch as the dock on the California coast after their dream Mexican cruise turned into one they will never forget but for all the wrong reasons


The 113,000-ton ship was on a seven-day Mexican Riviera cruise which started on Sunday in Long Beach, California, but only made it some 200 miles south of San Diego before the blaze erupted on Monday.

The boat spent over a day adrift before ocean-going tugs reached it on Tuesday and began the two-day limp back to U.S. soil which finally ended earlier today with emotional reunions with loved ones.

Ms Azila said she was afraid of the boat being hijacked by drug runners or pirates while it was adrift. 'I was scared. I was afraid for the 32 hours we were there, for sure', she added.

When the U.S. Navy ship arrived carrying 4,500 pounds of groceries she said: 'I thought, "Oh my gosh, we're going to be saved." It was like the cavalry was coming'.

As passengers stepped onto the dockside, one enterprising local was selling T-shirts with the message, 'I survived the 2010 Carnival Cruise Spamcation' - a reference to the tinned meat delivered by the U.S. Navy.


Cloudy: The cruise liner which was beset with problems is pulled into the harbour by tug boats as the foggy southern California morning greets them


But Carnival is now disputing the notion at Spam was ever served on the disabled vessel.

'Despite media reports to the contrary, Carnival Splendor guests were never served Spam!' the tersely worded statement said on the company's official Twitter account.

When the company was reminded that the U.S. Navy had sent out photos of its personnel delivering Spam to the ship on Tuesday, a spokesman for Carnival acknowledged that Spam was taken aboard the ship but said it was never passed on to passengers.

Carnival's senior cruise director John Heald said that the 'guests have been magnificent and have risen to the obvious challenges and difficult conditions onboard'.

Mr Heald wrote in his online blog: 'I don’t smell of roses at the best of times but as the laundry is not working and I only have two pairs of underpants I smell like Paris on a hot summer’s day.'

Las Vegas magician Seth Grabel, 28, who was waiting for his parents to come off of the ship said his dad was among hundreds of magicians on board participating in a convention from Missouri.



TV bound: A passenger held up a sign saying 'Next stop the Daily Show' probably in reference to the fact that their tales at sea will be sought after by many media outlets


'My dad is an amateur magician, but my mom hates magic. She was fighting this tooth and nail. She did not want to go on this thing. She had an intuition. I don't think my dad's going to live down this one,' Mr Grabel said.

Obviously his dad and his friends were not able to make the fire disappear that destroyed the cruise liner's propulsion and communication systems that led to passengers calling it a 'nightmare' journey.

The Carnival Splendor had been stranded 55 miles off the coast of Punta San Jacinto for the past three days with 3,299 passengers on board before being pulled in to shore.
A major fire damaged the vessel's engine and left holidaymakers without basic services including hot food, air conditioning and, for some time, working toilets.


Homeward bound: The Carnival Splendor is being towed back to San Diego after a major fire disabled its power systems


Relief: Sailors and ship crew help to unload food and water onboard the stricken cruise liner


Stricken: The 952ft vessel was left drifting after a fire badly damaged generators and left it without hot food, air conditioning and working toilets


Lenora Chavez said the ship was beginning to smell and many people on board were seasick.

She told ABC News: 'It smells like a lot of people are throwing up. I can smell that a lot and they have a lot of bags hanging in the corridors - vomit bags.
'And I think the toilets are getting full, so all of those things aren't so great.'


Essentials: cans of Spam are loaded on to a plane before they are flown to the cruise ship off the coast of Mexico



Ordeal: Passengers have spoken about illness and long queues for food on board the Carnival Splendor. Right, a Navy expert climbs on board


Drifting:The fire began in one of the vessel's generator rooms and took three hours to put out


David Zambrano told KUSA-TV: 'It's nothing like anyone expected. You stand in line for two hours just to get your food because everybody goes to the same place to pick up their food.

'Then once you get your food, you look for something to do. People are playing cards. People are standing around, just kind of talking. They're getting to socialise.

'So really, all we're doing is just kind of hanging out on a boat waiting for the next mealtime.

'It's almost like a diet cruise because we've been eating salads and fruit and small sandwiches.'

Passengers have been eating Spam, canned crabmeat and Pop-Tarts ferried to the Carnival Splendor by U.S. Navy Seahawk helicopters from the USS Ronald Reagan.

The ship still has no electricity, air conditioning and no hot water, according to passengers.

Greg Alexander, whose girlfriend Angela Evans is on board, said cabins were pitch black.

He told the Detriot Free Press: 'They're fine but worn out emotionally. The first couple days were a nightmare.'


Aid: Sailors on the USS Ronald Reagan take boxes of supplies off a Greyhound logistics aircraft


Supplies: A Sea Hawk helicopter lifts crates of food and water from the deck of the aircraft carrier


Luxury: Guests on board the Carnival Splendor swim in the indoor pool and watch a film on a giant screen (file picture)


The fire broke out early on Monday in the ship's aft engine room and took three hours to bring under control, according to the Coast Guard.

The damage left the ship floating in the water with limited power.

No one was injured in the incident, but crew were unable to get the ship's main generators restarted.

The Carnival Splendor was on a seven-night voyage from Long Beach, California, and included stops at Puerto Vallarta, Mazatlan and Cabo San Lucas in Mexico.

Because it was left without power, the vessel is believed to have rolled with the waves more causing passengers to become seasick.

Food supplies had to be flown to the ship after refrigeration systems failed.



Isolated: Gerry Cahill, chief executive of Carnival Cruise lines, said a crankcase in a generator room split, causing the blaze


Carnival Cruise Lines president Gerry Cahill said a 'crankcase split, and that's what caused the fire'. He added that it had been isolated to the aft generator room.

'This fire has occurred on one of the newest, most advanced and largest cruise ships in the world,' Peter Knego told USA Today.

'It just shows that any ship can burn - or sink, for that matter - and underscores the importance of good maintenance, up-to-date alarm systems and proper safety protocol.

'By all accounts thus far, it appears the ship's officers and crew have done everything by the book.'


source: dailymail