First Caribbean cruise since March aborts trip
Guests on tiny Seadream 1 test positive
Seadream 1, one of the world’s smallest cruise ships, departed Barbados on Nov. 7 with 53 passengers and 66 crew — the first cruise ship to venture back to sea in an industry docked since March by the global coronavirus outbreak.
But by the fifth day of the cruise, the ship was forced to halt what could have been a “watershed moment for the cruise industry” after a passenger onboard tested positive for COVID-19.
“People are shocked,” Gene Sloan, a passenger on the Seadream Yacht Club cruise, told the National Post.
Sloan, who had been writing about cruise and travel for the past 20 years, had boarded the ship on Saturday to see what it’s like to go on the first Caribbean cruise since the shutdown in March.
“The Caribbean is the world’s biggest cruise destination,” he wrote in an article for the Points Guy, “accounting for at least a third of all cruises taken in a normal year, and a resumption of sailings in the region is critical to the cruise industry’s long-term health.”
Standing in line to board the ship on Saturday had been a “strange” experience, Sloan said.
Each passenger had to undergo a COVID-19 test, a body temperature check, a pulse oximetry test; sanitize their hands, have their luggage sprayed with disinfectant as well as show several medical-related forms.
All passengers had been required by the Seadream cruise line and the Barbados government to test negative for COVID-19 via a PCR test three days prior to boarding.
Seadream also has started new cleaning and sanitizing measures on board the ships, with the help of ultrasonic foggers used by hospitals to disinfect rooms. They also installed a germ- killing UV light system.
While this would have been the first cruise in the Caribbean, Seadream had already conducted some cruises in Europe, all of which went off without a hitch.
Given the “level of rigorousness” with which the line had prepared its ships, it was easy to be skeptical of anyone coming down with a positive COVID-19 diagnosis once onboard, Sloan told the National Post.
After the exhaustive screening , the first few days aboard the ship had been “surprisingly normal’” Sloan said. People could still lounge by the pool, enjoying a drink by the bar, take a kayak out for a paddle or a swim. Most meals were served in the outdoor restaurant and people kept to their own groups.
The ship, he said, was built to serve 112 passengers; Carrying only 53, which amounts to 47 per cent of capacity, made it easier for passengers to maintain social distancing, as requested by staff.
Initially, passengers were not asked to wear masks onboard the ship, a move that generated some controversy among those who saw photos of the cruise posted by passengers on their social media accounts. The cruise staff had initially reasoned that masks were not needed due to the rigorous testing of passengers prior to casting off, but by Monday night had announced a change in policy that mandated masks be worn at all times.
Not all passengers were happy about the change, Sloan wrote, with some telling him that they had specifically booked the cruise because it did not require mask- wearing. However, in hindsight, not wearing a mask might have made it more likely for COVID-19 to be transmitted among the guests, Sloan said.
It’s still unclear how the virus found its way on to the ship.
Torbjorn Lund, the ship’s captain, informed passengers during a ship- wide intercom address on Wednesday afternoon that a passenger has tested positive for COVID-19.
All passengers were asked to isolate in their cabins for the next 24 hours as medical teams came onboard and went door- to- door to test all passengers for any virus spread.
Sloan, who was standing outside his cabin when he heard the announcement, said he slipped into his room without seeing any of the other passengers. But, based on the few he spoke with via email during isolation, he noted that people appeared to be a “little shocked,” but not angry.
The seven- day cruise, he said, was immediately cancelled and the ship docked at its home port in Barbados on Wednesday night.
There, another four people tested positive and passengers remained quarantined on the ship Thursday afternoon.
Sloan said the further four cases had been travelling with the original passenger to test positive.
The situation is “unfortunate,” he said, because the cruise line put a lot of work into a strategy for all worstcase scenarios. “They’ve spent a lot of time figuring out not just how to keep (COVID-19) off the ships, but if it gets on the ship, how to shut it down.”