OT?:Hundreds Forced to Evacuate Caribbean Cruise Ship off Mexican Coast --50 tons of oil spilled as ship cruises for 8 hours before hull breach is noticed

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You'd think someone would have noticed a hull breach sooner...is the electronic monitoring equipment screwing up?

Hundreds Forced to Evacuate Caribbean Cruise Ship off Mexican Coast

The Associated Press

COSUMEL, Mexico (AP) - Some 750 passengers, mostly Canadians, were forced to abandon the cruise ship Carousel after running over rocks, seriously damaging a propeller and causing an oil leak, Mexican authorities said Tuesday.

The damage was done early Sunday, shortly after the ship pulled away from the port of Calica on this Caribbean island located some 37 miles south of the popular resort city Cancun, according to a report distributed by the Mexican maritime authorities.

About eight hours later the crew noticed the damaged and suspended the cruise, the report said.

Small boats were sent out to the ship, owned by the British company Airtours, to ferry the passengers and their luggage back to the island, from where they were taken to Cancun airport, bound for Miami. They were to be offered the chance of renewing their cruise on another boat or getting their money back, a company spokesman said on condition of anonymity.

The damage to the bottom of the boat caused a 50-ton spill and contamination has been detected along surrounding beaches, port spokesman Fernando Valencia said.

Link:

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/florida/MGIX97SFQ4C.html

-- Carl Jenkins (Somewherepress@aol.com), February 16, 2000

Answers

What electronic monitoring equipment? I mean I know the Starship Enterprise has that calm female voice that says things like "hull breach immanent" and "hull breach on deck 27," but I'm not sure your basic cruise ship has invested in that technology yet.

-- E.H. Porter (just@wondering.about it), February 16, 2000.

Here we go with that small amount again, 50 tons... no big deal... right?

50 tons = 20,000 gallons + of diesel, just now being "detected" at beaches.

-- Electman (vrepair1@tampabay.rr.com), February 16, 2000.


50 tons is definitely a big deal in a place as beautiful as Cozumel. Hope they stomp down on who ever's responsible very hard. I've always liked Cozumel; that's where I spent the Millenium New Year 2000 (although I do admit that after lurking on this forum for a while, I did bring an extra $500 in cash, in case the ATM's on the plaza ran out over the New Years weekend (they didn't)).

My only point was that I don't see where this relates at all to computers, embedded chips, Y2K or anything else. I've never heard of "hull breach electronic monitoring equipment." The port of Calica has only been open for about 2 years and only fully complete for about a year. I suspect who ever was driving the boat just didn't know the channel very well yet.

The problem with speculative doomers on this forum is that it makes it impossible to sort out what might be real problems; they get drowned in the background noise.

-- E.H. Porter (just@wondering.about it), February 16, 2000.


Well geewiz G.H.... I know the people on this board are as sorry as they can be for cluttering up your 'puter screen with non-Y2k- related posts... perhaps you'd rather be here?

http://206.28.81.29/HyperNews/get/gn.html

For most of the rest of us... shouldn't they have a fuel gauge on this boat?... If it's a modern boat it should have a computerized "Trim :-) system, 50 tons of fuel should have been noticed about 45 tons ago :-)

-- Casper (c@no.yr), February 16, 2000.


-- Casper

No, just curious and looking for answers. Obviously, not looking at the fuel gauge for 8 hours is as good a reason as any to do bad things to the boat's owners. Way negligent.

But, is there such a thing as a Y2K non-compliant fuel gauge that will chose mid-February as it's failure date? Or is simple inattention a more likely cause of the problem? And, of course, the original post didn't refer to a fuel gauge problem, it refers instead to a more mystical "electronic monitoring" problem dealing with a "hull breach."

For whatever reason, I am interested in determining how many actual Y2K problems there are and what there effect is. Separating this out from all the posts that basically report anything bad that happens anywhere in the world makes this more difficult.

I mean, this is all very interesting -- but does anyone really think that this cruise boat leaked fuel for so long because of a Y2K problem?

-- E.H. Porter (just@wondering.about it), February 16, 2000.



I, too, am concerned about the spill off of Cozumel. The surrounding reefs provide some of the world's finest diving...too bad about all the cruise ships which are ruining it for divers...

-- Mad Monk (madmonk@hawaiian.net), February 17, 2000.

Then quit sniveling? Do your own research..... you sound like a troll that hasn't got a life.....

-- Casper (c@no.yr), February 17, 2000.

Seems funny to me that ALL the 'puter generated info, like fuel supply and Trim stat. would be missed by the crew....For 8 hours?!?!?.... 50 tons should have been noticed :-)

-- Casper (c@no.yr), February 17, 2000.

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