MIAMI (WSVN) – Cruise ship passengers have arrived in Miami after their ship faced turbulent weather while en route.
Passengers aboard Royal Caribbean’s Explorer of the Seas left Spain two weeks ago and docked in PortMiami on Sunday, days after bad weather caused chaos on board.
Video, shared by passengers to 7News, captured bottles and tables crashing onto the floor as the rough conditions rocked the ship.
Upon arrival, passengers described their experience on board.
“Dining plates, glasses, everything started tumbling down off the tables. People were running out of the dinner room. It was a bit of chaos at that time,” said passenger Sofie Dubois.
The ship departed Barcelona, Spain on Nov. 2 and was bound for Miami. The chaos occurred on the first night when rough seas and high winds caused the ship to sway to one side.
“Out of nowhere we start noticing it’s rocking and I see water sliding off the table and that’s when you see a whole bunch of plates going flying off, my food goes flying, chairs go flying, everyone’s panicking, ice machine goes flying everywhere. It was just a crazy experience overall,” said passenger Alvero Pupo.
The captain apologized to guests and asked passengers to return to their cabins.
“At this time I have to ask all guests to kindly proceed to your cabin. We will send a crewmember there to account for you. So, kindly remain there until you hear another announcement and we have accounted for everybody,” said the captain. “I’m sorry for this inconvenience. These things happen every now and then, not very often. It’s like an airplane hitting turbulence and high winds. I’m sorry that this happened.”
In a statement following the incident, a Royal Caribbean spokesperson wrote:
“During an unexpected wind gust near Tenerife, Spain, one of our sailings experienced sudden movement. One of our guests was injured and requires additional medical care, so the ship will make a call in Las Palmas, Spain for a medical disembarkation. We are communicating these changes directly with our guests.”
The ship stopped at Las Palmas, Spain to tend to an injured passenger who had to disembark from the cruise.
“I was in a state of shock cause I was like ‘There’s no way this is happening, i’ve only seen this in movies and i never seen this happen.’ And I realized it when it really tilted like ‘Woah, we’re really going through,’” said a passenger.
Despite the scare, passengers praised the way the crew handled the crisis.
“He kept us posted on weather and all kind of details so you felt secure,” said a passenger.
This incident happened on a transatlantic cruise, but passengers aboard a different cruise line experienced rough seas due to Hurricane Milton while in the Gulf of Mexico back in October.
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