Are Cruise Lines Doing Enough To Protect Passengers?

Last week I read an astonishing article about a lady who fell over board whilst on board a Royal Caribbean ship sailing from China to Shanghai.

Its reported that on Wednesday evening whilst enjoying an evening walk around Deck 4 the lady named Fran lost her balance whilst looking over the railings.

It must have been an act of god that she actually she survived the fall which was the equivalent of falling from a seven storey building!

She called out for help but her screams went unheard by the ship and I can’t begin to imagine her distress as the vessel left her stranded in the Ice cold Jelly fish infested waters.

Unbelievably she managed to survive for over 38 hours with no food or water by swimming out of the way of large ships so she didn’t get sucked under before finally managing to flag down a passing fishing boat on Friday morning.

Her family didn’t realize she was missing until hours later and once staff were informed of her disappearance a thorough search of the ship was carried out on Thursday.

But how did Royal Caribbean not know that someone had fallen overboard? Why were they not alerted to the situation once CCTV cameras had been checked?

Well, you may not believe this but  most cruise ships/ferries do not have CCTV cameras on  passenger decks.

This has been an ongoing debate for years with many people who have lost loved ones at sea campaigning that is should be compulsory for all passenger ships to have CCTV cameras covering external areas.

This would not prevent things like this happening but it would certainly give answers to families who’s loved ones have simply vanished and in this case the ship would known Fran had gone over board and could have alerted the coast guard.

Personally I think all cruise ships should carry thermal imaging cameras on board with an automated man over board system, but currently under maritime law this is not compulsory so ultimately its the cruise lines decision.

You will always find CCTV in the duty free shops so why then are cruise lines not protecting their most precious cargo of passengers and crew?

What are your thoughts? Do you think CCTV/Thermal Imaging should be compulsory?