‘Cruise Ship Virus’ Sidelines Cruise Ship

There has been a fair amount of recent media coverage of norovirus (or winter vomiting disease, AKA the “cruise ship virus”) outbreaks on cruise ships, and I was reminded of the first instance of a ship being removed from service due to norovirus. It was August 2002, and the ship was Holland America Line’s MS Ryndam.

After three consecutive cruises experienced significant outbreaks of the virus, Holland America Line took the difficult decision to remove the ship from service Aug. 1 to 7 to sanitize the vessel thoroughly. Ryndam was berthed at Port Everglades’ Terminal 29, a small, dingy, little-used facility at the southern end of the port well away from the busiest passenger areas.

I was sent to the port to monitor the disembarkation and mind the media who showed up. I had a sheaf of media statements to hand out and oversaw the creation of an area of the parking lot adjacent to the berth for the TV crews from local Miami and Fort Lauderdale stations. By the time Erik Elvejord, director of PR for Holland America, arrived, six TV crews (including CNN) had erected tents and stretched cables to six satellite trucks and were broadcasting live from the site, although all there was to videotape was a cruise ship sitting at a largely empty dock and a few short interviews with disgruntled disembarking guests whose cruise ended prematurely and who just wanted to go home.

That changed in short order.

Erik received a call from the port agent informing him that there was going to be a passenger medical evacuation. A female guest was experiencing cardiac symptoms and an ambulance was being dispatched to disembark her and transport her to a local hospital. Erik and I fanned out among the TV crews to inform them of what was about to happen and to reinforce that the evacuation had absolutely nothing to do with norovirus.

Then the sirens arrived. Sirens plural. Three ambulances pulled up with sirens wailing and lights flashing and immediately all cameras were upon them. It seems there had been a car accident on port property and the emergency vehicles at that scene all responded to the evacuation call.

Again, Erik and I fanned out to attempt to convince producers, reporters and videographers that this had nothing — absolutely nothing — to do with norovirus. But the tape rolled on … and on.

One ambulance detached and approached the side of the ship where a hatch had been opened and a gangway lowered. A moment later, two men in full white Tyvek hazmat suits were carrying a person on a stretcher down the stairs to the waiting ambulance. It made for dramatic TV. Of course, Erik and my desperate pleadings to the TV crews were ignored because the scene was made for TV.

After the patient was loaded and the hazmat-suited crew members retreated into the ship, the ambulance sped away, siren blaring and lights flashing followed by the other two emergency vehicles, which, formed a noisy, colorful parade. And it was all caught on tape and played on B-roll during coverage of the ship on all the local network affiliates and CNN.

Fortunately, that was the last of the made-for-TV action. By the next day, all passengers had been disembarked, there were no emergency vehicles, so the crews packed up and went home. Except one.

Roger Prehoda was a freelance videographer we used from time to time. He was at the port the day before working for the Miami NBC affiliate. I contracted him on the spot to do a B-roll project aboard Ryndam.

So, Roger and I and a sound technician were permitted onboard what the media were calling a “floating Petri dish” to collect background video of all the intense sanitation being done on Ryndam. We shot B-roll of people washing down walls, cleaning elevator buttons, wiping down handrails, spraying disinfectant on every surface of every stateroom and even the casino staff washing mounds of gambling chips by hand in buckets of sterilizing solution.

It was great B-roll footage that told an excellent story of how the cruise line was taking extreme measures to clean the ship, but nobody ever saw it. Holland America execs decided not to release the B-roll to the media despite the fact that Erik and the agency argued that it would put the line in a positive light and communicate that Holland America took the health and wellness of its guests and crew seriously.

But that was it. The ship was thoroughly cleaned and on Aug. 7 departed on its next scheduled seven-day cruise.

While there continue to be norovirus incidents on other Holland America ships as well as on the vessels of almost every other brand, Ryndam was the first and for many years the only ship taken out of service due to an outbreak of the “cruise ship virus.”