Although all cruise lines use strict safety guidelines to ensure the safety of passengers on their ships, cruise ship accidents can and do happen. Oddly enough over the last few years the cruise line industry has experienced a slew of accidents ranging from fires on board the ship, to engine breakdowns and even the sinking of at least one modern cruise ship.
Here\’s a quick list of the most recent accidents involving cruise ships:
- Carnival Triumph
- Carnival Splendor
- Costa Concordia (sank with the loss of 32 souls)
- Celebrity Mercury
- Norwegian Dawn
Then of course you have the most famous cruise ship disaster of all time with the sinking of the RMS Titanic in 1912.
So despite the fact that safety standards on cruise ships are constantly evolving and being improved upon, accidents can and do still happen. So what can you do if you\’ve been the victim of an accident while on a cruise ship, or while you were on shore when the ship was docked?
The first thing you need to do is engage the services of an experienced maritime lawyer, who has a proven track record in dealing with such cases. The reason why you need to specifically use a maritime lawyer is because admiralty law (the law of the seas), is dramatically different to the law of the land. The biggest mistake all cruise ship accident victims make is to simply choose a regular lawyer, which will usually result in them losing their claim for damages. A typical example of information that a regular attorney might not be aware of is that each cruise ship is registered in a foreign country and flies the flag of a foreign nation, which means that accidents onboard a cruise ship might fall under the laws of the country in which she was registered.
Another prime example of something which results in victims losing their case is the fact that there\’s a clause included on your cruise ticket, known simply as the \”forum selection clause\”, which means that the ship, and its parent company, can only be sued in one specific port in the world, which oddly enough is usually Florida. This then prevents most people from pursuing a case against them because it would be too costly to do so. In effect this clause means \”…you can\’t sue us, so don\’t bother trying\”.
A professional maritime lawyer would be fully aware of all of the above and also know the that the normal statute of limitations on any maritime legal issue is 3 years, providing most people with more than enough time to prosecute the cruise line for any injury to their person, or loss they experienced.
It\’s also worth remembering that an \”accident\” on a cruise liner doesn\’t necessarily need to involve a mechanical incident on the ship itself, but can also include storms, assault, food poisoning and fires – fires being an unfortunately frequent event on certain cruise ships over the last few years.
Remember that despite the fact that the cruise liner company may be trying to hide behind the \”forum selection clause\” in the event of an accident on, or near, their ship that you still have legal recourse in such matters as long as you are taking advice from a qualified maritime lawyer of course.