PORT CANAVERAL, Fla. — Passengers aboard Carnival's Sunshine may remember their most recent cruise not for the ports of call but more for what happened on board.
- Carnival cruise ship out of Port Canaveral tilts at sea
- Carnival Sunshine had issue with fin stabilizer
- Passengers reported falling glass, being pushed against wall
The ship arrived back at Port Canaveral on Friday morning after a tilting incident at sea.
"The ship went sideways, glass was falling, someone hurt their wrist. It's a safety issue," Carnival Sunshine passenger Kristen Smith said after disembarking.
Another passenger, Nannie Manning, said she's so traumatized, she may never go on a cruise ship again.
There were "bottles and everything started rolling, and it threw me against the wall," she said.
In one Twitter message, a passenger wrote, "get me off this ship," which had been asea since Sunday night.
The Carnival cruise ship responded to Twitter messages with, "The Carnival Sunshine is operating 100 percent, and all issues have been fixed."
The company said in a statement, in part, "There was never any issue with the safe operation of the ship."
Carnival said a malfunction with the fin stabilizer caused the ship to list, or tilt, severely for about one minute. Plates and glasses slid off tables. Passengers shared pictures of glass bottles strewn across the ground. There was some panic and screams, according to passengers.
It also said the fin stabilizer is not a safety issue but helps smooth the ride.
While passengers were waiting to get picked up by loved ones after debarking the cruise, quite a few people told Spectrum News 13 that although the incident didn't last long, maybe a minute or two, it was enough to make guests think the boat was at risk of sinking.
Bessie Manning told Spectrum News 13 that she watched the Titanic before going on the cruise, and she said it was a bad idea.
"I had watched it before the cruise. I thought about it when it tilted, that was the first thing," she said.
Smith said she's glad her mother-daughter cruise is over. They made their way to the port at about 6 a.m. and said she couldn't be happier to be on dry land again. It's going to be awhile before she even considers going on a cruise again.
"We got our life jackets and carried them all night. You can't sleep after that. You're scared. We slept with our life jackets," Smith recalled of the hours after the cruise ship listed.
Stephanie Manning said the cruise line gave every passenger a credit for the incident, but some said it's not enough.
“By the giving us $50 in credit, they got their money right back, so they didn't give us nothing," Manning said.
