The latest mishap to bedevil the cruise industry hit a giant Friday night: Royal Caribbean Internati

Information about what is happening on cruise ships is initially coming directly from passengers on ships armed with cell phones, iPads and laptops capable of maximizing at-sea discount auto rental florida bandwidth like never before.
Tonight I began to receive text messages from passengers aboard Royal Caribbean s Allure of the Seas stating that a fire broke out in the engine room, begins maritime attorney Jim Walker on his CruiseLawNews blog reporting on a minor engine room fire aboard Royal Caribbean s massive Allure of the Seas that was quickly extinguished Friday night.
discount auto rental florida The latest mishap to bedevil the cruise industry hit a giant Friday night: Royal Caribbean International 's Allure of the Seas, which shares the title of the world s largest cruise ship, reported a small and short-lived engine fire, according to a spokeswoman.
Passenger accounts of incidents at sea, ranging from helicopter medical evacuation to fires on board or stopping to rescue adrift Cuban immigrants are really nothing new.  Incidents have been reported online at sites like the nearly-live message boards of CruiseCritic or other cruise information sites for years.
On March 10th as the story goes,  birdwatchers discount auto rental florida on Star Princess using powerful binoculars observed discount auto rental florida a fishing vessel in trouble in the Pacific Ocean near the Galapagos Islands. Two weeks later the fishing boat was spotted again, this time with two of three crew members now dead from exposure.
Now, more than a month later, media outlets are reporting that one of the bird watchers observed one of the fishing vessel's crew members waving a cloth over his head in an attempt to contact discount auto rental florida the ship.  That same passenger alerted a crew member, offering his binoculars so the crew member could see also.
Star Princess did not stop. Now, the Bermuda Government has launched an investigation into whether or not the Star Princess cruise ship failed in its duty to assist a fishing boat in distress as is required by maritime discount auto rental florida law.  Princess issued the following statement as reported in the Bermuda Sun :
"Princess Cruises deeply regrets that two Panamanian men perished at sea after their boat became disabled in early March. Since we became aware of this incident, we have been investigating circumstances surrounding the claim that Star Princess failed to come to the aid of the disabled boat, after a crew member was alerted by passengers.
The preliminary results of our investigation have shown that there appeared to be a breakdown in communication in relaying the passenger s concern. Neither Captain Edward Perrin nor the officer of the watch were notified. Understandably, Captain Perrin is devastated that he is being accused of knowingly turning his back on people in distress. Had the Captain received this information, he would have had the opportunity to respond.
We all understand that it is our responsibility and also the law of the sea to provide assistance to any vessel in distress, and it is not an uncommon occurrence for our ships to be involved in a rescue at sea. In fact, we have done so more than 30 times in the last ten years.
The grounding of Costa Concordia and how it was handled by media worldwide is a textbook event to consider.  Some initial reports were that the ship was sinking, discount auto rental florida thousands had perished and there was little hope for the rest.  Some did perish but no where near thousands and the ship did not sink in a Titanic-like way.  Still, real-time video from passengers on the ship was limited only by the limitations of the ship s communication system, a status that is about to be upgraded.
MTN Satellite Communication s (MTN) are the people who enable most cruise ships worldwide to provide travelers with Internet access.  MTN's upcoming Next Generation Network is promising to "address the capacity, price and performance constrains the industry is facing today, across market segments, delivering the highest quality of products and services customers want," the company said in a statement.
"MTN is focused on specific areas of rampant industry innovation including cloud computing and mobile applications, for the world of satellite discount auto rental florida communications," said Wise. "Communities served primarily by satellite links have not seen the same pace of innovation, and we are going to change that."
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