Cruise ship crashes into dock in Roatan
MSC Armonia on the reef in Roatan
(CNS): A cruise ship crashed into a pier Tuesday, cutting a hole in the side of the vessel, which was attempting to dock in the port of Coxan Hole in Roatan. The MSC Armonia was supposed to pull up alongside the pier but instead the vessel appears to have arrived at speed and then ploughed into the concrete pier, smashing up the dock and crushing the side of the ship. The 58,000 ton ship, which carries over 2,600 passengers, is scheduled to call on Cayman next week as part of its current two-week cruise in the region.
According to a statement released by the cruise line to US media, the crash is still under investigation.
“While manoeuvring alongside, for reasons that are currently still being duly investigated, the ship deviated from her course and grazed the end of the pier,” MSC stated. “As to the ship, the damage was minor. She has also since been cleared by Honduran Port State Control authorities to continue her journey as soon as the necessary repairs are concluded. At the present time, ship personnel and external experts are still at work to complete such repairs.”
Damage to the MSC Armonia
The incident was caught on film by many onlookers and posted on numerous cruise-related websites and social media, going viral within minutes of the crash.
Local pundit Johann Moxam, who has been vocal about his opposition to building a cruise berthing facility here, said the incident served to highlight the need to reconsider the project.
“Before an expensive and environmental mistake is made that Cayman may not recover from, perhaps it be would wise for our leaders to consider all options and alternatives,” he said, noting that the marine environment is an integral part of the Cayman tourism product.
“Our leaders cannot afford to get this decision wrong from a long-term financial, socio-economics and environmental perspective. Think of current and future generations and the impact of getting it wrong. The people must hold all elected MLAs accountable.”
Urging people to voice their concerns and help them to strike the right balance, he said, “Strength in numbers is key. People must understand that the only thing elected officials fear is public pressure and losing political support that drives getting re-elected.”
Moxam is one of a number of people becoming more vocal in their opposition to the project, especially after the recent revelation that the controversial Chinese conglomerate, China Harbour Engineering Company, had been cleared to bid on what remains a far from transparent process about how this project will be financed and where the liability will lie, as well as who will take control of the port facility and for how long.
During the original consultation over the project, the people came down three to one against the development but this has been dismissed by the PPM-led administration, which continues to pursue the goal of berthing facilities regardless of public concerns.
Category: Business, Central America, Tourism, World News
Who has cared enough to start the petition or file the injunction?
Tell me what to do and I will have it up tomorrow
Who started a petition?
Any dock should be put to a referendum
Never going to happen, they know what the result would be hence, no referendum
If they thought for one second they could actually get public support on this issue they would have done the referendum years ago
Never underestimate the silent majority. See U.S. election 2016 where the polls (vocals) were completely wrong.
When Johan runs for election and wins then and only then will he realise that if one is not a member of cabinet it is very difficult to get anything done that is contrary to their plan. It takes much more than all the sabre rattling that he does. He has some good ideas but all the noise he makes drowns out the value of his utterance.
Johan gonna have back up next time who come with a pair and there’s enough of us to remove the Muppets.
The way he handled McKeeva the other day was impressive. Cayman needs more newcomers like John who have courage of conviction and sense that aren’t slaves to bs!
Don’t worry Moxam knows how to handle and himself gets it. He will do well when he wins.
Or, *any* of the fearless 21,183 reg’d voters, could start and circulate an online petition, pass it around via social media, and file result with the Governor. If only…
The reason why cruise ship passengers don’t spend as much as you’d like here is that Cayman is too damn expensive! It’s always been known as rip off island even to the wealthy Americans. It would be a far better idea if the hotels would come in line with other Caribbean islands and dropped their prices. If they can do it, so can you. You’d Have far more stay over tourists, especially from your mother country. Every mortal thing on this island is sky high in price! We are not all wealthy Americans people. We would love to spend a vacation here to this beautiful island, albeit crime ridden.
Thank the government for the prices. They can’t budget and always need more to pay the civil servants who are being investigated.
12/04/2018 at 2:45 am – LMAO!! ALL Caribbean islands are very well known to be more expensive than Mexico, which is where most Americans usually go. They are travelling further afield now because of how dangerous Mexico has become.
And THAT, my friend, is what we need to look out for, our crime.
Not tryna be mean but we are not here to cater to your wallet. If you cannot afford it, stay on the porch or find a place that you can afford.
Go to bed…
We used to drive all over Mexico (limo and driver because there were bandidos) for vacation every other year in the 50’s-70’s. Beautiful countryside, beaches, resorts, mountains, colonial towns, and pretty much dirt cheap everywhere. Flew back a few times later and it was sad to see Mexico City go to hell along with the west coast, the north and now Cancun and Yucatan. When we think of going now, the crime is always the overwhelming negative. Unfortunately the same is true of Jamaica, Bahamas, Windwards, Baja, DR, Belize, Costa Rica, etc Looks like it’s the Aegean and Cayman for us this year. Don’t screw it up. Tourists like to think they can go around on their own safely. You need to turn the crime situation around pronto. Reading the news is getting to be disturbing for us free spending retirees.
Roatan is extremely expensive and very dirty. Roatan caters to tourists with its cheap quality tourist souviners at ridiculously expensive prices. Our accommodation is more expensive but we have a far superior Island to visit and the food choices here far exceed anything you can get in Roatan. You get what you pay for
Have you travel to other know hot spot islands hotel are not cheap by any means. Unless your staying at the trashton inn!! A nice hotel in ochi is 269 per night and thats not your all in hotel just your nice 3star minimum. So your point is not made! But it is fact the cruise passenger have cut spending and it for the fact that cruise is the way a lot of tight budget vacations are taken as you get many stops see more places and cost less than buying flight to each one! And everything on the boat is include. So they mite buy a shirt or spoon with the flag or even just might even grab sum duty free but that now also a market being flooded all over!
There’s really not much for passengers to buy. The duty free stuff is no cheaper or different than back home nowadays. There is nothing to tour. There are a some restaurants and bars, but they are already stuffed from the boat and nursing hangovers, so you can’t expect too much there. The rest are shops for tees and knick-nacks, and if you want to go to the turtle farm or sting ray city you book through the boat. Everyone has already seen dolphins somewhere else. If all this was cheaper, it might make some difference but I doubt it. Cheap hotels would just bring more low spending tourists. If that was a viable approach, there would be more than one turtle nest inn. As for the all inclusive resorts, have you seen the poverty outside their gates. You have it good in comparison.
There are 2 types of people who support the idiocy of such a project; those who benefit (select few) and those too stupid to see the big picture not sorry i said that). Amazing how our Leaders are mute on this; including the supposedly vocal opposition; utter corrupt lunacy that will send us back to fighting mosquitos when its all said and done. Moxam, I feel their silence is partly due to questions you publicly voice and many of us think. Tired of the f**kry. Ready fi war. Bullet.
You tell em dinky.
SSM345 Is that a threat that politicians need to take serious or just you running your mouth? Scary!!
Not scary, just drunk talk.
Uh, huh, yeah. Try breathing into a bag.
This was an unfortunate accident. Accidents do happen and it was most likely an electrical malfunction. Most people in Cayman who do not want a cruise ship pier, fail to understand the economy of the island, or how difficult and dangerous it is for a ship to off-load passengers by a tender. Navigator of the Seas today took over 2 hours to get less than 2000 passengers off the ship (they had about 3,500 on board). If the ship had docked most of the passengers could have walked off in 30 minutes. The real benefits of cruise ships to this island occurs when the passengers get off the ship and take a tour or buy something, or dine in a restaurant. When the Norwegian Epic comes with 5,200 most of the people do not even get off the ship so Cayman do not receive maximum benefit from all these ships that come here. When 5 ships arrive with 17K people less than 8,000 people usually get off these ships.
@ 11.08 am – You are short-sighted.
Even if you get 3,000 people off in less than 20 minutes….where is there to go and how fast can you get them there?
Cayman does not have the infrastructure, the public transport or the resources to deal with that much people at once; hence why the tendering process works for us.
What we could be spending money on is a facility (instead of a side-walk) for passengers to utilize whilst lining back-up to board the ships.
A dock/pier is a temporary fix with an unjustified amount of money to be spent with no profit to be made from it what so ever!
Money wasted from the public purse!
accidents happen, just because an oil spill happens somewhere else in the world doesn’t mean we’re going to shut down all of our gas stations now does it?
I think the MSC captain had just been told he’d left his cuban girlfriend behind in West Bay.
I would love to see the people of Cayman rise up and say a resounding NO to the Cruise ship berthing facility. The country needs to focus on other internal problems and the wealthy jewelers do not need a pier.
The island infrastructure cannot support more cruise ship visitors and the quality of island life suffers as a result.
The underlying assumptions for the pier with the Genesis class ships taking over has not come to pass and the pier idea really needs to be scrapped.
The opposition is against it in the LA but unfortunately a select few are still looking to push the ill fated plan forward.
Most everyone I know is against it but they don’t care whether the public is for this idea or not they have been trying to do this for years both Mckeeva and Alden want this
I only wish Johann would have brought this issue up when he had Mckeeva backed against the wall last friday what a sight that would have been
did your ancestors came by boat or plane?
we had ships hundreds of years before planes
Truer words were never spoken. Dump the dock!
This is interesting….Can happen in Jamaica but not here? Why spend $300M when we can get one of these for a fraction of that…Just sayin..We could even move it to Spotts when necessary…
http://www.seatrade-cruise.com/news/news-headlines/jamaica-signs-with-seawalk-to-open-cruise-ship-access-to-historic-port-royal.html
For the same reason that Dart can build and entire new school for $45M and CIG built Clifton Hunter for $100M and spent nearly $10M for just a gym for John Gray …They just don’t get it..politics as usual…
Still the big question is do we need a dock o should we be concentrating on upgrading our airport with more gates and jetways to get the more lucrative stay over passengers?..There is not even beach left save for SMB Public beach for the cruise visitors to go to..
The mess some of these cruise shippers leave on our beaches is shocking. I recently witnessed one group empty out their beer bucket, bottles and all onto the sand and just walk away. Then 5 minutes later, a group who had been building sand castles with plastic cups just walked away and let everything. Plastic cups, knifes, forks, napkins etc. Utter scum!
I had my 2 year old and 4 month old with me and didn’t fancy getting into an argument at the time.
Yes we cleared it up 😉
Or the local beaches after OUR Easter camping trips. Litter bugs are pathetic local or visitor.
People like to shit on Dart and CB but look now, the only school being expanded to meet the higher demand for spaces is CIS
The other private schools cling to money like a thirsty man with a drop of clean water and the CIGs projects are always overbudget, delayed, and the result of a reaction instead of a plan put in place
Private schools don’t have Darts money, have to raise it by bank financing and increased fees.
Has anyone been to Bonaire? Nice cruise dock, lovely unspoilt island. The two can go together…
Yup, and an eye-watering petty crime rate. Been there twice and you have to leave your rental unlocked because if you lock it the locals will smash the windows and the glass isn’t covered by the insurance. They break into second floor condos while the occupants are in there asleep. Not a good comparison.
Speed 2: Cruise Control!
Prediction: Visit Nassau and see what a mess their downtown is with the cruise port, visit any other Caribbean island. Cayman was built on being unique, the jewel of the Caribbean. I do not understand why we have to join other third world countries, this is where we are heading.
How can we guarantee we will increase the cruise passengers with new ports opening up in Cuba, Asia? The Caribbean is over cruised as it is…… and who wants to pay $800 per night to sit on a “seven mile beach” with all the cruisies? WE are at cruise passenger capacity as it is with 2 million passengers.
We will lose the overnight visitor who contributes much more. It is a shame this has been led by retailers who are too lazy or stupid to change their business model to suit.
This is the end of our island, Grand Cayman. Every person sitting on the Conservation Board should stand up and resign as it is obvious politics, and lining ones pockets takes precedence over the delicate balance of nature.
Instead of building and catering to the overnight passengers and medical tourism which brings in more money, and potentially continue to bring in more and more money….and building a world class airport we throw money and the environment away. Now we end up with a fancy cruise terminal and an airport whose design is terrible.
Unfortunately, by the time we can vote these self serving politicians out, the damage will be done and we can kiss this all goodbye.
How will a pier with 4 spots bring more ships. As a matter of fact if we built a dock with 15 spots do not mean we will have 15 ships. They are going to stick to the schedule regardless.
Bottom line, it will not benefit us. This is a move made by the greedy politicians.
yes we are unique that is why we have nicer roads with nicer cars
Mark my words – This house of cards will fall Cayman!
Aren’t our cruise ship arrivals already as high as they have ever been? If that’s true why are those that depend on cruise ship tourism complaining they can’t make a living and we need more? Restaurants closing, George Town dying, crushed under the weight of people leaving us nothing but garbage and sewage problems. cruise ship visitors do more damage than bring in dollars.
300 Million to bring us more volume in a failing business model won’t fix your financial woes. It might finish topping off mount trashmore.
Oh I forgot, it’s actually the head tax the government gets from this that is desired. Government wants those fees and they will mortgage your and your children’s future to get it.
You’re ignoring the fact that the head tax is needed to pay whatever financing is used to build the thing in the first instance. Someone gotta be paid.
This dock is nothing more than a bailout for a failing business model of the downtown merchants. The Cruise ship industry has changed and will continue to change so the dinosaurs need to adjust to the new climate or go extinct.
Modern day cruise ship passengers have much lower disposable income than those of the past. They don’t spend money on island to the same degree and with a birthing dock they are more free to leave and return to the boat, which will cause them to spend even less as they will just return to the boat for meals etc. Modern day cruise passengers are just sightseers and window shoppers. So spending more economic and environmental capital to bring more of these to the island is many levels beyond stupid.
We need to market ourselves more and target the high disposable income tourist. Brand our product as the best experience in the Caribbean where you don’t encounter panhandling or a mass amount of people trying to be in a place too small to accommodate them comfortably.
Cayman is different so why follow the rest of the Caribbean with a mega dock? Lets be OURselves and play to OUR strengths and not try to be the mini jamaica or dominican republic or cuba.
40 years from now when private air travel will be the norm with technology advances, will we be happy we didn’t invest in this massive relic of the past or will we stare at it with disgust and wish we were more forward thinking?
ships been here a lot longer than planes I think you are very young
Once you destroy your marine environment you can’t get it back.
https://cnsbusiness.com/2015/06/watersports-business-warns-against-cruise-dock-proposal/
how come we now have increasing record numbers of cruise visitors when pro-dock people said the industry will die without docks?
You must be new here.
This didn’t just happen or creep up on us.
Because the people promoting the dock are the ones (the only ones?) who will profit from it.
There is too much risk for the dock project. The reality is far worse than that I am afraid… Assuming the $350mm is CI$, and the current head tax is, I believe US$14 (approx CI$11.50). Now, using your same calcs:
350,000,000/11.50 = 30,434,783 passengers
@5000 (a bit high but run with it) per ship = 6087 ships
@4 a day (again, generous – over the year it is more like an average of 2 per day, but run with it) = 1522 days = a little over 4 years
More realistic figures for ship capacity and visit amounts would result in a figure closer to 7-8 years. And that is just to recoup the cost – no ongoing expenses, maintenance, improvements and things they won’t think about when they build it like shade – cause we all know the tourists are going to love a long walk on a concrete slab in the heat or rain…
And all that time, that same money, that previously went to other areas of the economy, is no longer flowing there, it is paying back a massive debt. So that money needs to now come from somewhere…
$350,000,000 / 75000 residents = $4670 per resident. Not a huge sum, but be assured this will translate into say a 20% increase in business licensing and permit fees, or a 30% increase in duty… All costs to the people as is correctly noted. And once those increases are in place, they will stay there…. LONG after the $350,000,000 is paid off…
The economics just do not support the port dock plan, plain and simple. Even if funded by someone else, they will want to make the money back – either by diverting head tax, increasing fees, or another manner which will no doubt trickle down to hit our pockets.
And the best part – with all those extra tourists, we will need a better infrastructure, roads, sidewalks etc. And then there is the additional waste we will have to manage…
And then, fingers crossed none of these ever happen – another global financial crisis cuts tourism spending, an acto of terrorism shuts down international travel, a hurricane hits Cayman and we cannot handle the ship visits for a few months or more… Then who covers the bill? Where do the loan payments come from then??? Not that any of those things could EVER happen here… But if they did, then what?
Anyone know of investors that like to buy sovereign debt like this and when the payments dry up, they get to foreclose on it?? Anyone?? Phew. OK, I guess we don’t have to worry about that as a possibility…
You can’t expect the “geniuses” we have in government to think about all of that! Especially when the person spearheading it is only looking out for his family and also does not like that the owner of the tenders used to transport cruise passengers is making that money.
You need to add in the financing cost (interest) on the $350m – that’s probably another year added onto the repayments effectively.
Also keep in mind that all that head tax is not new money. It’s already being spent on other things right now. What part of the budget gets the axe to pay the dock debt?
Maybe the Chinese are going build 5 more sandbars, 3 more SMB’s, convert GT=WB to pedestrian only (oh wait; someone else doing that already) moving all businesses East, and the 42elewenteen other things that we will need to even accommodate these “sangwich eatas”. Didnt DART even stop cutting out that tiny chunk of the beach because of the effect it would have on the rest and now Govy wants to remove acres at the other end? If this goes forward every Caymanian better get their UK Passport because this will blow up in everyone’s faces apart from those select minons benefiting and they will be long gone. Sinking everything on an old business model and then wonder what went wrong. Next up we will be bring the biggest “pager” company ever to Enterprise City.
hush your foolish nes ness and build the damn we need the dock., period.
Let this thing die already. Build a trade school for your people. Finish the high schools, institute a proper public transportation system, fix the dump, etc. etc.
1.01. Exactly!
5.52 you should be proud if he did. But maybe great minds think alike?
The one point that the people fanatasising about turning GT into a ‘Genesis’ class destination miss is that the latest generation of cruise ships are floating resorts and designed to be self-sufficient. If anybody had bothered to check some of the current itineraries they might have noticed that the number of stops has dramatically reduced in the past couple of years and also that some of seven-day cruises actually spend 80% of their time at sea. The fact is that these vessels operate most efficently and make most money for their owners at sea. Bluntly, the people claiming that a cruise dock will guarantee the arrival of mega-liners in the future are delusional. This is the old, ‘If we build it they will come,’ mentality and trust me it doesn’t work – I’ve seen way too many tourism projects around the world that fell victim to similar thinking.
1:00 That’s spot on but you’ve copied and pasted this from a comment I made a few months ago.
Exactly. And not only are they floating resorts, but they also have a larger number of better equipped stores on board. Just because they come, doesn’t mean they will spend. From personal experience in other ports, these ships are not the cash cows that our merchants and government seem to believe that they must be.
I have the same concerns as Mr. Miller and Moxam here. And the study by CREST is interesting and logical. Grand Cayman is a very small island and so can only accommodate a finite number of visitors, a small number when compared to many other locales. We are already over capacity at seven mile beach and stingray city / sandbar, which are our two most popular tourist sites.
Of genuine concern also is; as others have voiced is CIG’s poor track record at handling even moderate projects (good examples voiced as the high schools and now garbage collection / disposal) woes.
Add to this that the wealthy merchant class (including especially one local family) are to gain the most by more cruise ship passengers and the Tourism Minister and Deputy premier is of same family (should he be the leading Govt. person on this?…) and the lack of hard data or transparency….and we have a real long term mess brewing.
One that us and our children will be left to pay for for many years.
Seems to me we should be enhancing things for our stay over visitors and solving our problems with the dump and education….which both negatively impact our tourism product.
Until CIG can show conclusively and transparently the need / cost / benefits of this to the wider Cayman community, I cannot support this project.
Do you think it’s an accident that after years of granting concessions and negotiating these type of massive deals deals nobody in successive elected government or Cabinet and the civil service that handles the administrative process can provide any details of these deals or track benefits to the Cayman Islands?
In the case of the port, government need to publicly share information before they commit the country to a project of this magnitude and costs. How is this being handled any different to the China Harbor dock negotiations that contributed to McKeeva Bush’s down fall as Premier in 2012?
Corruption takes many forms and is institutionalized in the Cayman Islands. Hence, why none of the current or past elected officials want the Standards in Public Life Law to come into effect. Roaches prefer operate in the dark and the lack of accountability is the oxygen than makes them braver every year.
If the cruise ship berthing facility becomes a reality the quaint little port town overlooking the sea will be a thing of the past. Instead it will be looking out at a dock where those in favor are the jewelry store owners and the Minister of Tourism. It will be the final nail into the coffin which was once George Town.
Please do not allow the fear and greed that the pro dock lobby have spread. Cayman does not need a dock and the infrastructure is overwhelmed now. Save the money and use it for the Cayman people not a few merchants.
check or good book and you will see how many times the rich man and the poor man is mentioned
that will never change sorry.
Moses & Alden are going to cost this country in ways we never thought possible while they all retire to fat pensions
The cruise lines are economic hit men. They will eat the CIG team led by Moses K and Ministry of Tourism Chief Officer Stran Bodden up in the negotiations.
This cruise port project is another bad deal waiting to happen for Cayman long term that will make the FCIA deal with Dart look friendly. Can anyone name the last time CIG negotiated a deal that gave the country value for money?
Yep! Just keep dragging that anchor along beside you. That won’t do any damage to anything down below… Because isn’t that why there is a dock in the first place????
There isn’t enough of anything in Cayman to support the addition of 10-20,000 more cruise passengers every day. Not enough beach, not enough sights, not enough stingray city, not enough downtown waterfront, not enough parks.
But there is the sister islands… why not do development there?
Right. Why ruin only 1 island when you can ruin all 3. Bad idea.
AND RUIN THEM ALSO?
Well said Mr. Moxam. It’s rare to see a local brave enough to express a balanced view and stay focused on the issues.
No dock! Tourists visiting on a cruise yesterday even told me it sounded like a horrible idea.
The Captain must have had 2 spliffs of ganja and 5 shoots of rum before trying to dock that ship like that . I have never seen a Captain docking a ship that size at that speed . The wake at the bow in the video says alot about the speed . I would think that Cruise ship Company can get ready to build a new dock for Roatan .
If he had smoked ganja he wouldnt had crashed
The Captain mistook the gas pedal for the break pedal, common mix-up.
Build our dock
cayman can not afford a port.
cig has not got the expertise to procure or manage it properly. (remember cig cannot even collect garbage)
end of story
If you watch the taped video you will see that this ship was anchored. It is obvious that the winds shifted and blew the ship on by the small dock. The ships disembark with jets underwater and does just that in this tape.
That is actually not the situation D. Nate Smith. And by the video that doesn’t even look like the obvious answer.
He was coming in hot (under power, not blown in by the wind and certainly as common sense would tell you, at that speed!!), wheel and all of the sudden the tannoy started bellowing. It was all hands on deck to hang on!
Those anchors were down to try to avoid a crash. They also had the thrusters on full reverse.
have you checked how many anchors drop on our coral per year?
Based on Mr. Moxam’s logic, we should not have any roads either since drivers crash into things. Walking or swimming would appear to be the only mode of transport allowed, so that when I crash into something I would only damage myself.
There will always be accidents caused by incompetence or mistakes.
You missed the point probably deliberately.
Are you kidding? I think it’s a terrible idea,and it does seem that many people are averse to this project, but Dart apparently have this already arranged so don’t be surprised to see this get pushed through. Despite the potential damage to SMB both short and long term.
Coming to a harbor near you!