“There are prisoners and corpses in the holds”: cruise passengers discovered the liner’s secret rooms

A Russian couple, whose husband pleased his wife with a prestigious cruise on the warm seas of Southeast Asia on March 8, is in shock: they decided to explore a luxury cruise ship, and stumbled upon a real horror film – dead people and prisoners.

After listening to the frightened tourists, we asked questions to a man who had worked on more than a hundred cruises as a ship’s doctor.

“To be honest, my husband Roma and I were looking for a ship prison that we read about on the Internet,” Marina admits. – That, they say, every cruise ship has one of these, and they throw troublemakers there. But instead they came across something even more terrible – a dead woman. That’s what it says there – mortuary – author)!

According to her compatriot, a minute later a security guard arrived and kicked them out of the compartment at the bottom of the plane, where there was a door with such a sign. We found out whether there is any reason for them to worry from our ex-compatriot Elena, who now lives in the USA and works as a ship’s doctor accompanying cruise groups.

“Of course, on every cruise ship there is a guardhouse or guardhouse,” admits Elena, “as well as a morgue.” A cruise ship can accommodate up to 5.5 thousand people and is not an airplane that can make an emergency landing in the event of an air row or death on board. Some cruises last for several months, with several days on the high seas between ports. If a passenger or even a crew member suddenly behaves inappropriately, where can he be isolated to the nearest port? Or did someone suddenly die? Of course, there is a refrigerator room on board with a mortuary sign.

– And she scared our tourists!

– It may be empty, but it must be on every ship going on a long voyage. Like death certificate forms, they are required by law to be on board. And a ship’s doctor, like me, who will witness this death. On large ships there is usually a whole team of doctors. You need to fear not the dead, but the living. In my memory, one eccentric millionaire wanted to take a cruise around the Caribbean islands in the mortuary instead of a cabin. They tried to reason with him, but he gave triple the price and still floated to the morgue. He stated that he wanted to “survive” death.

– Are the prisons on cruises also empty? Our curious travelers did not find anything like this on their ship.

– Nothing surprising, the guardhouse is in a closed area, guests cannot get there, and the team has limited access. And the morgue is run by the ship’s doctor; he could simply forget to close the medical bay if he was gone for a short time… From experience, prisons on cruise ships are filled more often than mortuary rooms. On long, expensive cruises, alcoholic drinks are included in the price, they are served around the clock, and there is also a lot of motion, so those prone to alcohol abuse on the high seas develop a heavy binge faster.

– A strange combination – an expensive cruise and heavy drinking!

– Alas, quite often. In general, the worst thing on expensive cruises is getting fat and drinking. According to statistics, over 2 weeks of swimming, guests gain an average of 6-8 kg, even if they swim in the pool. And against the backdrop of alcohol abuse, domestic disputes begin.

At the guardhouse, the alcoholic is visited by the ship’s doctor, given the necessary medications, and in most cases, under conditions of isolation, after 2-5 days, depending on the severity of the condition, the condition returns to normal. But those who break the law in the nearest port will be handed over to the authorities and sent to a real prison. In some cases, criminals have to answer according to the laws of the country to which the ship is registered, even if they have nothing to do with it. And the laws of, for example, Belize may be much less humane than American or European ones. It is also strictly forbidden for cruise staff to have romantic relationships with guests; on some ships it is even forbidden to share the same elevator with guests. This applies not only to technical personnel such as sailors and maids, but to everyone, including the captain himself.

– Do they often die on cruises?

– In my memory, thank God, there is only one. But according to statistics, an average of 200 people die on cruises every year. This figure also includes elderly people who died naturally from old age; many old people like to “live” around the world, especially European ones. There are no age restrictions when selling cruises. And think for yourself, if a person over 80 goes on a seven-month cruise, can anyone guarantee that he will return from it alive? This is just normal, this is life, for this purpose, on every cruise there is always a priest and a funeral team, which, in such a turn of events, will help the relatives of the deceased with the repatriation of the body to their homeland and going through all the formalities. It is much worse to become a victim of fire, which, alas, is not uncommon on cruises; the larger the ship, the higher the risk of fire. The rest are suicides, disappeared, accidents on board or a sharp exacerbation of chronic diseases – heart, blood clot, etc. The rarest cause of death on the high seas is premeditated crime, unless pirates suddenly attack.

– Do pirates still exist? And what does “disappeared” mean?

– I haven’t encountered this myself, but my friend, who works on a merchant ship, was captured by Somali pirates along with her entire crew. Fortunately, everything worked out fine. Pirates are usually interested in merchant ships, not cruise ships. We have a real floating fortress, guests are safe. But the disappeared are the scourge and mystery of cruise shipping; their organizers are missing an average of 20 passengers a year. That is, some of the guests simply do not reach the port of destination; they are neither among the living nor among the dead. Maybe they fell overboard somewhere in the open ocean, or maybe they jumped off themselves – in any case, they will never be found. I’m lucky, I only have one Oscar over the years.

– Who?!

– Oscar is the crew’s code word for man overboard. If this was announced over the loudspeaker, it means someone fell overboard. You can’t announce something like this directly, the guests will immediately panic. For each emergency, the crew has its own code.

Current cruise workers do not have the right to publicly disclose all cruise codes, but there are some on the Internet, the existence of which Elena confirms. Operation Bright Star (on some Alfa aircraft) – urgent medical attention is required. Operation Rising Star – death on board. Thirty-thirty – urgent technical assistance. PVI – public vomiting, mass motion sickness, calling a team of doctors and cleaners. And the most alarming codes are Bravo (fire on board), Kilo (requirements for personnel to urgently occupy emergency positions) and Echo – control is lost, we are drifting.