For some passengers, this has become a cruise to nowhere.
After enduring a coronavirus outbreak on a Carnival Corp. luxury cruise liner, some passengers say they are still trapped aboard another luxurious “ghost ship,” isolated and unable to get home -- more than a month after they first set sail.
Four passengers from Argentina and one from Uruguay spent Easter confined to their cabins on Holland America Line’s Rotterdam, at sea in the Caribbean. Holland America said they were blocked from going home by the Argentine government’s Covid-19-related restrictions.
They are among thousands of passengers still aboard ships almost one month after the world’s major cruise lines agreed to halt cruises because of the dangers of sailing during the pandemic.
“It’s like we are ghosts on a ghost ship,” said Claudia Osiani, 74, of Mar del Plata, Argentina, in an phone interview from her cabin in the Rotterdam. “We just want to go home.”
Osiani began what she hoped would be a dream cruise on the Zaandam on March 7 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. “Then it turned into a nightmare,” Osiani said.
The Zaandam was stranded at sea for three weeks as a flu-like outbreak sickened roughly 250 passengers and crew. Four people died, including two with Covid-19, according to Holland America. Hundreds of people, including Osiani and her husband Juan Henning, were transferred from the Zaandam to the Rotterdam at sea, near Panama, as passengers and crew were sickened.
The couple have been quarantined since March 22, first in a small cabin with a sealed window, and now in a spacious suite on the near-empty Rotterdam. Six medical exams have shown them to be free of Covid-19, Osiani said.
Holland American had evacuated 1,200 passengers from the Rotterdam and Zaandam soon after the ships docked in Fort Lauderdale, on April 2. “But not us,” said Osiani. She and the other Argentines on the Rotterdam were blocked from boarding a charter flight Thursday because their government declined to authorize their return, citing restrictions imposed during the pandemic.
As of April 7, 53 guests and service staff remain on the Rotterdam, Holland America said. And some crew members may be stuck at sea for awhile as well.